Easter

Made origami bunnies this afternoon, waiting for our last case to start. Still weren't the last case, though. A day to mind the gaps. One surgeon done, waiting for another who started late in another room. When we overlap, we save time by removing the turnover time from the equation. When we gap due to changing surgeons, especially this one who is not speedily efficient, the staff waits. And waits. So, I began folding.

Easter has never been a loved holiday. In my home, it meant a week in church. More than a week. Every day of school during Holy Week, we started the day with Mass. By Easter Sunday, I needed the bribe of chocolate just to console me having to wear dressy clothes and sit on hard pews so long. More of a disadvantageous trade off than a treat.

One year, my old Easter basket was brought down from the attic, and my mother discovered it had been useful as a nest for mice. I didn't really see why they couldn't just clean it up and use it anyway. My mother was not about to countenance using a mouse-shit basket for my chocolate. Still, it was a very nice basket.

At some point, when solid chocolate bunnies got hard to find, I asked instead for a chocolate block - which had become a thing. My mother loved putting in the malted milk chocolate eggs, and whatever else struck her fancy. When I was very, very small, my brothers would lead the morning search for the basket, as any hidden eggs belonged to them, but the basket was for the baby-sister. As I got older, I was perfectly content with simply looking out the back porch, knowing it would be there in the cold. And a lot of chocolate would be sequestered in the plastic grass under the chocolate bunny.

I bit off the ears first. Then popped off the eyes. No sense being watched. Or listened at.

I have TJ's chocolate, dark with almonds, in a bar, these days. When perfection is achieved, stop searching.

Just glad of spring.

Have I mentioned lately how much I love my house? I love my house. It's my home.