Even though many of us did not get to have the Easter we had originally planned, I hope everyone had a nice one.
It was much quieter at our house than it normally would have been since it was just Mom, Dad and me.
I did feel a little bit wistful early in the day since Easter is one of the times of the year when we normally get together. But everything turned out fine and throughout the day we heard from nearly everyone.
Easter always brings early childhood memories. The Reporter is always closed on Good Friday, so we usually turned up at my grandmother Adams’ house on Thursday evening in Crandall, just outside of Dallas.
In my youth Crandall was a very small farming town on the Blackland Prairie. I’m sure, because of it’s location so close to Dallas, that it has grown so much that it’s now a suburb.
First order of business on Fridays was to color the Easter eggs. All of my cousins and I would gather around Nannie’s big kitchen table covered in newspapers and dye them all sorts of colors. Nannie would tie her aprons around each kid’s neck knowing we were about to make a mess. I hated eating eggs but dying them was fun.
There was a school across the street from her house and that’s where we’d have our Easter egg hunts. I never bothered with the dyed eggs. Thank goodness there were brightly wrapped candies and marshmallows.
I remember one year we had Easter baskets for the hunt that were actually little shaving kits from TWA Airlines. That’s how long ago that was.
My sister, Kathy, and my cousin, Connie, were always in competition with each other in the Easter outfit department. One year when they were in junior high Connie was dressed head to toe as a flapper and Kathy was so jealous.
Later, as adults, Kathy and I talked about those Easter memories. That year Kathy had a very brightly colored mini-dress and she remembered being mad because she thought it was too long. The pictures we were looking at proved her wrong. It was not too long.
This year Mom and I talked about all the things we were going to eat for Easter Sunday lunch, which is always our big meal. “Let’s do this, let’s make that,” we said with starry-eyed enthusiasm.
When everyone went to bed on Saturday night we had no real plan other than we knew we were having ham.
I was very happy to see two cans of green beans and a box of macaroni and cheese on the counter when I woke up the next day. So much for our big plans, but it sure was tasty.
I also picked up some very good tomatoes from Joe Hairston at the Chamber of Commerce farmers market. They were unexpected and delicious.
After lunch we all settled in front of our TVs but something was bothering me no end. My hair.
I was already in need of a haircut when all of the shelter-in-place started and it had finally reached a point where I couldn’t stand it anymore.
I had gotten a trimmer for Christmas and I put it to good use. I now look like a recovering cancer patient, but I don’t care.
Well that’s not exactly true because on the day after Easter evidently we are going to have winter all over again and now my head is cold. Crazy Texas weather.
I have had my hair trimmed very short twice before in my life but it was done by someone else. And out of necessity after two miserable failures by being the model/guinea pig for a friend who was going through cosmetology school.
The first one was for a “highlights” test. This was back in the days when your hair was pulled through a cap. My friend gave me some red highlights. When the cap came off I was Bozo the Clown with my mom’s black Adams eyebrows. Had to trim that off very short.
The second time the test was for a permanent wave. Now mind you my hair is very straight so I didn’t know what would happen to it. I had never had a perm before. My two little brothers were my sister’s guinea pigs and I saw how theirs turned out.
Anyway, my friend wrapped my virgin hair in perm rods, put the permanent wave solution on, handed me a magazine and left me to “process.”
One by one the rollers with my hair still wrapped around them started falling into my lap. I was sure that wasn’t supposed to happen.
Luckily they didn’t all fall off. Only the ones in front. I tried for a couple of days to deal with it. No luck. Once again trimmed off to start all over again.
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