"An Easter Anecdote"

 Today is Good Friday, or Holy Friday as it is called in many places, and Sunday will be Easter. I wish you the best for this holiday, as we celebrate Christianity’s most important day. (The photo is one I took from the internet.)

 

 

Sydney M. Williams

 

More Essays from Essex

“An Easter Anecdote”

April 3, 2026

 

“Let all the flowers wake to life;

Let all the songsters sing;

Let everything that lives on earth

Become a joyous thing.”

                                                                                                “Easter” c.1870, Fannie Isabelle Sherrick (c.1840 - ?)

 

While the United States is a religiously pluralistic nation – with the right of free exercise of one’s religious beliefs guaranteed by the 1^st Amendment of the Constitution – we are, still, predominantly a Christian nation. And Easter is Christianity’s most important holiday. On Easter we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ, redemption, and the promise of eternal life.

 

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But it is also a day we associate with rabbits and Easter egg hunts. Rabbits, with their high reproduction rates, symbolize fertility. And eggs – unless boiled, fried or poached – are indicative of new life. German folklore provides a connection. The Ostern Hase (Easter Hare) was a mythical creature that judged whether children were good or bad. Tradition has it that the Easter Hare gave colorful eggs to the former.  

 

Most of us have childhood memories of Easter, of warm spring days, church services and Easter egg hunts. The latter was a fixture in my young life. Growing up on a small farm, with artist parents, we were outside every day. Easter came when the damp earth smelt sweet and trees began to bud. Snowdrops and daffodils, if not out, were about to enter stage left. Forsythia shrubs were not far behind.

 

Our family attended the Unitarian Church in Peterborough, New Hampshire. My mother generally gave us a nickel or dime to place in the collection basket. Once, the youngest, George, reached into the basket and grabbed a handful of coins, which promptly fell on the floor. Us older children then spent the next ten or fifteen minutes scouring the floor, picking up coins and replacing them, while the minister droned on. Following Easter service we adjourned for the highlight of the day – the Easter egg hunt. My mother had hidden eggs in a field that abutted the front yard. It was a field usually occupied by goats. 

 

Neighbors and friends would come. And as we were a large family – nine children when my parents had completed their spawning duties – there was a crowd. Eggs were abundant, for our Rhode Island Reds had been busy laying in a supply. Prizes were awarded for the most eggs and for the individual who discovered the “golden” egg. One time that sticks in my mind was when my father thought he had lost my sister Jenny. She had been born in 1948 and was about a year-and-a-half old. He became angry when we all laughed instead of searching for her. Finally, my mother, through tears of laughter, told him she was on his shoulder. He did not find the incident funny.

 

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While such memories are rewarding, we should not forget the real reason we celebrate Easter – the death and resurrection of Jesus, and Earth’s rebirth as spring surges ahead.