Happy Easter, Daniel

    

I think the chocolate buttons are your favorite.

  When I think of Easter, I think not only of the religious significance of the resurrection of Jesus Christ, but I think of you.  I don't think any of my children enjoyed Easter as much as you did.  Each year, the snowy Winter would give way to crocuses sometimes peeking out in the snow, and then to seeing bursts of forsythia.  Then, the rural tradition of ducks, rabbits,  and chicks that would appear in each hardware or feed store.  We had rabbits when you were born and since we always had them, they weren't a driving force for you. Each year you wanted to take some ducks or chicks home.   Thank Heaven one year we brought home ducks, and another year a couple of years later, we brought home chicks.  I am glad you had the joy of these experiences. We still have some of the more long lived creatures that we bought when you were still on Earth, and we certainly still have many of their descendants. Of course, some of them have already joined you at Home.

I love you and my Dad wider than the oceans and deeper than the seas, and I always will.

            I remember our annual family Easter Egg Hunts.  We would have these on the Saturday after Good Friday and before Easter Sunday.  I would arm each of you with an Easter basket, and hide plastic Easter eggs, filled either with wrapped treats or with coins.   You loved the hunt probably more than the others. I still remember your bubbling enthusiasm for the annual hunt.  Did you know I have kept all those baskets ?    Last year, I saw some plastic Easter eggs that were fashioned as dinosaur eggs !   I thought of you as I snatched them up.  The outer shell is fashioned in green with a tough textured exterior.  These would be very tough to find in one of our hunts, against the green grass !   I will hold on to them. Eventually I will discover what to do with them.

           This year there will be no hunt.  With each of your siblings in their twenties except for our beloved adoptee, who is almost there also, there are no children or even teens to celebrate in quite this way.  Still, with the cool air, pollen, verdant grass, I remember so clearly, as if it were yesterday, or the day before, your joy in the celebration of Easter. And if I haven't said it recently, thank you for coming to Earth to be my youngest son. I wouldn't have missed it for the world, despite the fact that our time together ended sadly.   I love you wider than the oceans, and deeper than the seas.

The grass is deep enough for the hunt !

Our posts on prior Easters:



 http://learnedfromdaniel.blogspot.com/2012/04/easter-recollections.html

http://learnedfromdaniel.blogspot.com/2011/04/easter-in-2011.html

http://learnedfromdaniel.blogspot.com/2010/04/cracked-easter.html

http://learnedfromdaniel.blogspot.com/2009/04/salvaged-egg-hunt.



Concerning Daniel's ducks:

http://learnedfromdaniel.blogspot.com/2013/10/daffney-duck.html