Nancy Quillin Long 26
April 2011
Easter morning has changed over the
years, but technology hasn’t done away with the traditional egg hunts. I feel certain, though, that today’s children
would not know what to do with an Easter bonnet or white gloves. Easter, as I knew it, saw a deluge of new
hats, white patent leather shoes, white gloves and sometimes a duster to match
our dresses. Since Easter can come in
the dead of winter or in ninety-degree heat, outfits for the occasion included
long-sleeved coats which went over the dress.
Of course, we wore the dresses all summer, but the duster never made it
out of the closet again. We wore lace
trimmed socks and carried purses to match our patent leather shoes. The Saturday before Easter was spent washing
and rolling our hair.
Easter Sunday, of course, is a very
holy day for the Christian world. We
honor Jesus Christ for dying on the Cross for our sins and being resurrected so
that we can have everlasting life. He Is
Risen! And mother would respond, “He Is
Risen, indeed!” I’m not sure how Mother
managed Easter morning with the special outfits and hairdos and also remembering
to have everything ready for after church, but I very rarely saw her
frustrated. She just did what she had to
do, and she took care of me well.
Church attendance was at a premium
with everyone in their new attire. After
church, we would quickly change clothes, jump into the car, and head to Crowell, Texas, a 30-mile drive west of Vernon. It was there that, as a child, the
celebration began.
I had a large extended family on my
mother’s side, which included Mother, and her sibling's families: sister Reitha Jo Jones, brother Martin Frank Jones, sister Doris Marie Jones Jackson, sister Dorothy Faye Jones Lynch and all their
children, and I feel that my cousins were some of my best friends. Pappy (Joe Carroll Jones) was a layman and a
deacon in the First
Baptist Church. He was very capable of delivering a
sermon. Mimi (Ava Ella McNair Jones) was
the one who worked hard to prepare for our Easter family gathering. Throughout the week, she would prepare much
of the food and bake all different kinds of cakes and pies.
And then the real fun began. The men folk would hide the eggs – I never
knew the Easter bunny. For several years
the hunt was staged at my daddy’s terraced farm and amid the newly planted
wheat crop. If not there, it would be at Pappy's farm or in
Mimi and Pappy’s backyard. I know kids today
still hunt for Easter eggs, but they believe that “real” Easter eggs are plastic eggs from Wal-Mart
and crack apart to reveal money and candy.
The eggs I searched for were individually wrapped colorful candy eggs,
and THAT was the prize. A side note – I
remember as a Campfire Girl, that we would dye hard boiled eggs and decorate
them for the State School. Our adult
leader would take them to the school so that the patients would have an egg
hunt…. but I always wondered if they really ate the eggs. It was fun as a group, though, to prepare the
eggs.
So… some things haven’t changed,
yet I worry about our society that has become so politically correct about not
offending the non-Christian religions that we are losing sight of the greater
impact of Easter on our lives. Gone is
the mention of this holiday in any ads or news articles, and Good Friday in the
big city just seems to be a vacation from work and school. Many people work on Sundays anyway, so Easter
is no different.
However,
He Is Risen Indeed and Easter will always be a celebration of our eternal life.
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