Bunny Hop

At the holidays I am always aware of the absence of my mother and my grandmother, and I see them both in my (osteoarthritis) hands and in all the foods I make.

Easter isn’t my high holiday because I do not subscribe to a religious franchise myself. I mentioned again to Kenny that I was “raised” Lutheran only because my mom needed a BREAK from us kids, she didn’t drive, and the neighbors went to Calgary Lutheran Church and they were fine enough with us piling into the back of their station wagon along with their own six kids to cart us off to church.

That was my churching, and where I went to vacation bible school each summer, because again, my mom needed a BREAK from us kids.

But still, despite my lack of the religious aspect of the holidays, they were times to come together as family to celebrate with our special foods and that is a tradition I still carry with me.

Even when, like today, it’s mostly me eating by myself. I still do all the cooking.  Today I brought my mother into the meal with “her” slightly modified potato salad recipe and “her” deviled eggs, along with the usual Easter meal cast of characters: ham, pierogi, cabbage.& noodles. I added my own, roasted carrots and charred brussel sprouts and individual baked french baguette loaves (Trader Joes).

I’ve slightly modified the potato salad to include Kenny’s grandmother’s version with a heaping dose of celery seed. For him, it’s not potato salad without the celery seed, and I agree with that decision.

Is that the most styled photo you could hope to see on the Interwebs, Reader? No.

Do I care? Also no.

This is what an actual bowl of potato salad LOOKS like- life isn’t an Instagram photo. It’s a green plastic bowl with miracle whip smears on the sides due to heavy mixing.  I’m not wiping that off to prep for a photo. This is how food that you prepare at home – or that food our moms and grandmas prepared – looks.

All during the cooking journey I sang along loudly with the radio and sipped a fizzy rosé and proclaimed THIS to be an almost perfect Sunday.

I washed my bedsheets and draped them over the deck railing to dry in the warm Spring sun. I’m looking forward to them tonight.

I watered my plants and kissed my cats and danced in the kitchen and ate a donut that my friendie Marv brought to me yesteday.

if that’s now what the holiday is supposed to be about, then I don’t know what is. Appreciating the day that you have in front of you, eating good – if not fancy – food, and at some point spending some time with “your” people. Kenny will be home soon. He drove his mom out to a relative’s house for Easter so they could bond over THEIR traditions.  As it should be. There are no rules as to how you are supposed to enjoy a holiday – unless YOU make those constraints for yourself. We do our thing, and it works.

I sometimes invite a housefull of folks over to eat and make merry with us, but today? I wasn’t sure I wanted to have to put on pants, so I held the day closely to myself and enjoyed it, just as it is.