| Sunday, March 27, 2005 |
| A Movable Feast |
Despite being raised in the Catholic faith, I left the Church at 17, had a brief attempt at rekindling what little faith remained during college at the Newman Center in Madison, WI, and then decided that a complete break with a patriarchal dictatorship that didn't fully respect women or independent thought was probably best for both parties involved.
Nowadays, I'm primarily agnostic. Despite this background, I have never completely understood why my birthday falls on Easter Sunday every 11 years - until now. After last year, it won't fall on Easter again for another 62 years, so I probably won't be around to see it again.
The reason? Easter is one of the Christian calendar's "movable feasts". That means it can fall anywhere between March 22 and April 25 according to the Gregorian calendar, because it is always the first Sunday of the first full moon after the Equinox. See? Simple.
All of this background is by way of saying that regardless of any religious overtones, I had a wonderful Easter weekend in the spirit that it was perhaps intended. Thankfulness, celebration and renewal.
I got to spend quality time with my sister the violinist, and we had a wonderful evening cooking a wonderful meal and just hanging out on Friday night. We had some retail therapy on Saturday morning (SHOES!!!), and then proceeded to my cousin Donald's new house -a McMansion estate really - north of Bel Air, MD, where we had a GREAT day visiting with my Aunt (Mom's sister), Uncle, various cousins, theirs kids, in-laws.... It was simply wonderful to spend time with family, tell family stories and share a terrific meal. The food was simple and plentiful. The house is amazing. Don is a builder/ developer, so the house is one of his own design. They just moved in about 8 weeks ago, so this weekend was a bit of a housewarming. The place is HUGE. Soaring ceilings, more bathrooms than I can count, and a kitchen with appliances that I would gladly sell my soul for. It was a great day / evening.
Today was equally luxuriant. Slept in, read the NYT, coffee, breakfast, lounging around, and then a scramble (pardon the pun) to make a tray of "deviled eggs" (good for Easter don't you think?) to take to our friends Jeff and Laura in DC for the next movable feast.
Similar to two weeks ago at a brunch at my house; when you get a group of close friends together for great food and get to spend precious time with each other - there aren't many things better in life than that. I met Jeff when I first landed in Baltimore 10 years ago and he was fresh to DC from Rochester, NY. Neither one of us knew many people, so we were best friends in no time and spent most of our time going to baseball games and concerts together. I vividly remember him calling me after his first date with Laura (a tennis game) to tell me how special she was, and later, four years ago, when he called me on another Easter morning from a drugstore, because he had bought a plastic Easter egg and hidden her engagement ring inside with some plastic grass and candy, and was so nervous and excited about asking her to marry him......
Fast forward, four years later - we're having the third anniversary Easter brunch at their wonderful home with Laura's family and 14 friends (and a ham, a turkey and more food and champagne than you can possibly imagine). Last year, they celebrated my birthday with a surprise party. This year, we celebrated the impending birth of a firstborn to our friends Susan and Luke who are due in 3 weeks.
Friends and family - it's all about love, and that's all the religion you need in this life........
Hope you all had a great Easter. |
posted by Broadsheet @ 8:28 PM   |
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| 5 Editorial Opinions: |
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My birthday fell on Easter a couple of times ... I think when I was 12? And I suppose 11 years after that. It's always a nice combo ...
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Happy Birthday!
It's my birthday too. Weird!
(Actually, I couldn't quite tell from your post, whether your birthday fell on Easter this year or last...)
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Happy Beaster! So, you're 31, just like Seadragon, right?
:o)
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Thanks people, but my birthday was not on Easter this year. it was on Easter LAST year. I still have a few more weeks before I turn 33.
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My birthday fell on Easter a couple of times ... I think when I was 12? And I suppose 11 years after that. It's always a nice combo ...