Our Easter Weekend

Sweet miniature daffodils and two varieties of large showy ones circle the lamp post in Katherine’s front lawn. These were planted back in the day when she could still walk and work in the garden, a favorite activity. Her lovely flower garden in the corner of her back yard that she worked so hard on was destroyed when a huge tree from the park landed on it in a storm. I have tried to take some blooms inside for her to enjoy since she rarely is able to get outside in the sunshine these days. It seems a shame she did all this work and does not get to enjoy it. Three of the showy ones centered her table yesterday for Easter dinner.

I considered titling this blog “A Different Kind of Easter,” but realized that was inaccurate. The Easter described by Matthew. Mark, Luke, and John, is the same as always. How we celebrate it may be different as it was for us this year, but what we are celebrating remains the same: He is risen!

Woodsong was quiet this Easter weekend. There were no adults catching up on each other’s lives, laughing and talking late at night. There was no singing or piano playing. There were no grandkids coming and going. No one made nests in the yard as my mother taught me to do as a child, a custom which our children and grandchildren continued. There were no egg-dying parties at Katherine’s house or ours as in the past. I did boil eggs on Saturday and dye them quickly by putting several together at once in three bowls in three colors. But the eggs wee done dutifully for the table the next day and not as the messy creative experience the children always enjoyed. No one made the traditional bunny cake that Mary Ellen started as a small child and the next generation continued. In fact, I experimented with my first purchase of a sugar-free cake mix and icing. I did not buy a single bag of candy. There was no need.

We had a deluge of rain on Thursday night. Mary Ellen called the next morning to say that since they were unable to get in the fields, they could take the opportunity to go visit Brian’s northern Illinois family and be able to also see Jeannie. Jeannie’s family has always been able to come down for Easter weekend; and since that was impossible this year, I was grieving her absence.

Mary Ellen and Brian were grieving Brianna’s absence this holiday for the first time in her life. Meanwhile down in Nashville, Leslie and Mike were having his parents in for Easter from Ohio. The Texas families could not come this far right now so they were celebrating there, except for Gerry who was with the A&M softball team in Atlanta playing Georgia Tech. Geri Ann was with the Oregon softball team playing at Los Angeles against UCLA. (Both of “our” teams lost their first game in the series and then won the next two.)

So Gerald took me and the dinner I had prepared into Katherine’s house as she had no aide on the holiday. Then he went out and picked up Trent, who didn’t go with Mary Ellen and Brian, and they went to church together. Sam and I started Katherine on her morning routine—adjustments, tooth brushing, adjustments, glasses cleaned, adjustments, egg, toast, juice, and meds. David’s family from northern Indiana was down at David’s folks, so after David came by to check on Katherine, he went on to his family celebration.

I cleared off Katherine’s large kitchen table of the meds, fruit, and mail accumulated there. I used paper plates and spring-colored plastic cups. (I first wrote “glasses,” but I guess plastic can’t be called glasses.) With her pretty bright daffodils, the deep colored eggs in one of her lovely crystal bowls, the colorful ribbon salad I always make for this holiday meal, the table was pretty enough that Katherine exclaimed when she saw it after her daddy took her with the Hoyer lift from bed to her wheelchair. Her exclamation made my efforts worthwhile. (When she went off to college, one of the things I missed was her appreciation for efforts that I made to add color to the table with food or flowers, napkins or pretty dishes.)

The greatly reduced menu this year in addition to the Easter eggs, salad, and cake included the baked ham, scalloped potatoes which I only make at Easter now-a-days, peas, rolls, and grapes for the healthy eaters. Instead of fifteen or more of us, five of us were able to pass food at the table instead of people having to serve themselves from the buffet as we do at our house. Instead of Sam and Trent being off at the “kids’ table,” it was fun sharing our table with two young adults. (Sam will be 18 on his birthday this month, but life has required him to have adult maturity long before his birthday.)

After dinner on the way to his Cedar family evening dinner celebration, Sam took Trent home, where he continued texting friends, playing games, or doing whatever he constantly does with great skill on his phone and computer connecting with people all over the world. Gerald found Geri Ann’s game for us to watch on Katherine’s big-screen television for our afternoon entertainment. Noon pills came at 3 or so. I stayed on through Katherine’s small supper meal, more television, and finally the evening routine including night pills.

After a long day starting with cooking at home, I was getting tired as I do every evening and was very grateful for two of her church friends who come in emergencies to put Katherine back into bed. People at her church have been extraordinary in helping her for many years now. And Jeannie is telling me the same thing is happening to her with extreme kindnesses from so many people.

When Gerald came in to pick me up, I found him in the kitchen with a tool tightening screws on Katherine’s table that he observed was getting as shaky as our kitchen chairs, which he had felt compelled to tighten that morning. (I had not noticed, but was glad he had.) We were both in bed by 10 o’clock, probably another first for me on Easter night. It was a different way of observing Easter for us, but the reason for rejoicing was the same.

Springtime in Southern Illinois

Driving to town provides welcome change from the sparse color of recent winter drives.  Redbuds reached their peak of beauty in our area for Easter weekend. The dogwood here is just beginning to bloom. The smell of freshly mowed grass is in the air, and the green lawns sport redbuds, peach blossoms, and crab apple blooms. I like the bright yellow blobs of dandelions in many lawns, and they make me think of our late friend Zella Cain, who also liked dandelions.

 Not all but most of the lacy white blossoms on pear trees have now been replaced with small green leaves matching the abundant greenery of grass and the leaves on shade trees during this annual reawakening. However, trees in woods along the roadside seem slower to achieve leaves, and that makes the appearance of the occasional redbud blossoms peeking through bare brown limbs especially lovely. 

Unplowed fields are often covered with the pinkish purple of henbit, and occasional bunches of yellow mustard plants are showing up.  The large patch of daffodils that I annually sneak a bouquet from has now been replaced with lovely paperwhites that seem extraordinarily abundant this year. I assume these daffodils and paperwhites were planted by the same woman oh so long ago beside a house no longer there.  She would be surprised at how they have spread out over this large area beside the road and up into the bordering woods.  

Although we had a smaller group than usual for Easter at the farm, Cecelie persuaded her mother to take her to Bloomington, where she caught a ride down with her brother Elijah at Illinois State.  Despite the pressure of end-of-semester work coming up, Brianna came home from Murray State.  These kids all landed at Mary Ellen and Brian’s farm house and stayed there, but were in and out of Woodsong as they planned their usual group shenanigans, which this year included kidnapping their cousin Sam to join them despite his not feeling well.  (Yesterday’s definitive diagnosis of Lyme disease started him on a 21-day regimen of antibiotic and the promise of feeling better in ten days. This was a relief.  How he has kept going full speed despite growing sicker all the time is beyond me.) 

These kids went over and volunteered to help hide eggs on the church lawn at our village church, and they stayed up to all hours talking over summer plans, current happenings, and the transitions in their lives. They did all their customary childhood activities including dying eggs and making Easter nests on the lawn.  Mary Ellen had volunteered to do the centerpiece for our dining room table, and it was very cute with the metal rabbit she had found the previous weekend at Hannibal, MO. She hosted the egg dying and brought over the bunny cake and the goodies for the kids to decorate it. (I think she was seven or eight when I turned over that decorating over to her.) 

Elijah gifted us with a beautiful song at worship in the village before we gathered for Sunday dinner here.   Katherine had worked out precision plans for an aide to bring her out for Easter dinner, but she was unusually weak and felt too bad to come.  The evening aide did get her to church Sunday night for at least part of the service.

  

Since our Georgia families were involved with softball games at Athens’ Jack Turner Stadium, we spent some time both Saturday and Sunday afternoons watching that series on the University of Georgia website.  We won two out of those three games and were disappointed again today to lose a home game against Georgia State.  Next we play three games against Alabama at Tuscaloosa on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday.

Both Gerald and Brian have been busy lately burning the limb piles from winter clearing. Gerald has cleaned out flower beds, mowed the huge lawn he has created, plowed the garden and done some planting already. Brian began farming this week after the delay caused by the heavy rains.

Somehow Gerald has found time to go with his brother Keith over to Southeast Missouri Hospital at Cape Girardeau to sit with their brother Garry, who is there with Ginger, the love of his life.  Our sister-in-law has been the victim of multiple strokes, seizures, and the resulting problems since December of 200l.  (There had been previous episodes, but that 2001 stroke was the disabling one that they have had to cope with.)  Garry and Ginger are both heroes in my view.