easter, baskets and lambs.

first off, the embarrassing statistic that i just read about, the one where americans spend 1.9 billion dollars on easter candy this time of year is astounding, pathetic and disgusting. it makes me want to throw up when i hear numbers like that. and aren't we already fighting obesity and diabetes at a rapidly growing pace in the US anyway? do you know what that kind of money could do to help fight poverty and homelessness in the US, much less how much medicine that could buy for the entire continent of africa fighting aids and malaria, how many wells that could be dug that would provide fresh water for so many third world countries???? we could even just give that money, 1.9 billion each year, back to uncle sam instead of aunt hallmark and start to help ourselves out of our own country's embarrassing debt..and that's only easter. i don't want to think of all the other holidays quadrupling the tab. ok- ok, i digress.

anyway, i know this to be true and it turns my gut...yet, still somehow the american "tradition" of twisting easter from it's original meaning to the hallmark infested, candy ridden and bunny hopping holiday that it is now, somehow finds it's way to your doorstep when you have little ones. it's like drugs or hypnotism....you want to make the big feast, buy the pretty spring duds to wear to church, dye the eggs and make the baskets and create magical traditions for your family...ian and i want to teach our children the truth and joy and freedom that comes with the resurrection of Christ. yet, i also adore the fantastic madness that comes in an easter egg hunt with your cousin's at your aunt jody's house or on the lawn of Cochran Chapel... it is hard to find that balance and many times i step over it and back....guess it is the human, the mom and the girl in me to want to sing joyfully about the open tomb but also want a pretty dress to wear while i am doing it...how vain and stupid? i know. how completely bi-polar, extremist and hypocritical. but there you have it. i somehow, have to hide my face and duck my head as i sadly, in the end, contribute to that awful statistic above as i get lost in the holiday sometimes too.

so at any rate, after that long preface, i know rae and emily will completely understand this and "get" me.....and hopefully my friends and family will love me through my madness....

i lost it in target yesterday. i stood in the easter aisle and watched all the little girls with their mommies picking out baskets, sparkling candy, stuff to make cookies together, testing out bunnies and duckies for softness....some even sporting their easter dresses early because you give a little girl a frilly dress and she will want to wear it everywhere, even to bed. especially to the store.

i stood there frozen and thought about sydney's easter basket from pottery barn that is sitting boxed up in the garage, the one i bought months before she was born, the one that matches liam's and is personalized with her beautifully sweet name in white across the yellow linen cloth, i did this secretly before we even named her because for us, that was always going to be her name i think.

i thought about how i should be buying a pink easter bunny or even a white lamb for her basket and setting out both kids easter surprises on the table the night before like my mom did when we were growing up....i thought about how all these mom's have no idea how lucky they are...and i broke down. i wanted my little girl so badly. i wanted her in the buggy with me in that very aisle and i wanted to be singing the hallelujah chorus to her and making ducky sounds as i waved a soft yellow duck before her tiny eyes.

on aisle whatever, at the end, in front of all the plush stuffed animals. i wept and couldn't stop. i had a girl bunny and a boy bunny in my hand and i stared them down for what seemed to be hours...i was completely unaware of all around me, the people probably trying to get past my cart, the kids likely screaming for more candy on the next aisle...i held these two bunnies to me and asked God once again, why this was my fate? why me? i know you aren't supposed to ask that, but i did. why do all these women have their happy endings? why does mine have to have this tragic interlude or chapter attached to it? why can't i buy my baby girl an easter bunny? why can't i fill up her easter basket like liam's?

so, i did what any mad-crazy-mourning, empty handed, heavy hearted mom would do.

i bought that damn bunny. both of them.

very proudly and almost with sneaky hidden joy, like i was stealing it, so weird. like i deserved it, that i got the right to do this for my little girl even if she is in heaven already with the resurrected one Himself....i can't explain it. but it was freeing. i was allowing myself to still celebrate easter with my little girl the way i wanted to with her growing up.

i bought my son and daughter matching easter bunnies. and i bought her and liam a chocolate cross for their baskets, instead of the chocolate bunny...i thought at least i am trying to work the jesus factor in here instead of pushing peter cottontail as the big hero....hardly a huge theological lesson in a cocoa covered cross but possibly irreverent?...oh well. liam get's it. he knows what the cross means, no matter if it is wood or dipped in hershey's. he will tell you "that is where jesus died with nails in his hands and it hurt him a lot. but he got hurt because he loved me."

i then and there decided to pull out sydney's easter basket later out of storage and came home. then when i had to tell my mom outloud what i had done, i was worried that i might seem desperate...that she might want to have me locked up...but she didn't. she simply said, good. i am glad it made you feel better. we cried together and went on with the day.

i have no doubt that not one parent in my grief group would find this odd what i did. some would say it might be therapeutic and healing...but crazy? no way. nothing seems too crazy anymore since we lost her. that was our breaking point of crazy in our lives.

it is my way of grieving, what i did...the on-going process of saying goodbye...or letting go...

easter does have a new meaning to me now...
as i sing about the place that Christ returned to on the third day following His death, i know our sydney is there with Him...

as i rejoice in His Homecoming and the freedom His blood means for me, for all those who love Him and call on Him to save them, i know she is free too...

as i praise a God who can raise a dead man back into the heavens, back to life, back to Him....i can't help but smile and feel so proud that if our little girl can't be with us, she can see Jesus face to face and hold his hand and sit with her own Lamb.

i guess that is far better than any stuffed sheep, bunny or duck i could have ever given her myself.....