Easter Alone

‘J Cori Anderberg doesn’t want to be alone on a holiday.’ That’s what I’d like to write on my facebook status update tonight. But I don’t want to sound all pathetic and sad. Like someone fishing for an invite. Fishing for invites is the type of thing that eats away at one’s dignity. Or perhaps just one’s pride. Scott is Stateside for the next week and a half. I’m alone--well, without Scott--on a holiday. It’s such a lonesome prospect.

There are probably any number of folks I could hang out with. Any number of people I could give a ring and say, “Hey, whatcha doin’ for Easter? Mind if three of us Anderbergs tag along?” I’m sure I will. Call, I mean. I’ll suck it up and make a phone call or two or three. I’ll be brave. Right now though, I just feel sad and pitiful and it brings up all kinds of pain.

Once again, here I am...a foreigner in a foreign land. I’m so used to being the includer. It’s tricky being the one with the need to be included. Once again I’m leery, cause I still don’t quite know the rules. I am learning though that the rules are pretty important over here. An English friend had said they didn’t have plans either. I said we should do something. Then emailed and asked if they wanted to get together. She texted me today inviting me over Saturday. I’m stoked. I think we’re going to go to a castle and it’s supposed to be one of the good ones. We’ll have a great day. She’s super fun, and I love to be around her and her hubby and their little guy. But...well, I’m still without a gig for Easter. Nothin’ to do on a holiday, and I’m pretty sure the rules are that I don’t say, “couldn’t we do Sunday instead?”

Plus, I’m the mom. So I’m the one who’s supposed to make it special and fun. I realized on Wednesday that I had no plan. Not good. But not too big of a problem. What does one need but an Easter egg hunt and a couple of cute Easter baskets filled with plastic grass and Peeps?!? I even had a great idea--these cutie pie gardening tool bags with kid-sized tools they’d loved at the local garden center. Perfect for an Easter basket! Well, I looked everywhere for plastic eggs. No love. I went back to get the tool bags. No love there either. Plastic grass or Peeps? Fuggedaboutit. I can’t even find a UK ‘PAAS’ equivalent to color our eggs!

On the one hand the lack of uber-commercialization of holidays here is refreshing. Christmas was nuts, but it’s the only one that’s been like that. Easter, Halloween, Valentine’s Day--these all get a minor poster or two and an end-cap’s worth of confectionary. No big deal. I like that most of the time, but this time the commercial goodies were the only way I could think of to make the holiday seem even partially normal.

There will not be new polo shirts and cute shorts for the boys from Old Navy. There will be no brunch on the front patio at Mom’s eating Dad’s omelettes and Sawan’s divine deviled eggs. No sneaking gluten-filled bites of Ellie’s whoppit-biscuit cinnamon rolls with orange icing when the boys aren’t looking. There won’t be the traditional Cherry Knolls Easter Egg Hunt on Saturday with bucketfuls of fun toy-filled eggs and Starbucks coffee for the set-up crew. Or Grammie’s front-yard egg hunt Easter morning with gobs of penny and nickle and dime-filled plastic eggs and hints of “warmer, waaaaaaaaarrrrrrmmmmeeerrrr, warmer, oops! Colder, colder, colder.” No apres festivities Rockies game--either at the field or on my parent’s couch. Certainly no backyard-baseball. The best part of the day.

I’m lonesome. I’m homesick. It’s exacerbating as all get-out that Scott is gone too. Bad enough that I’m without the aunties and uncles and friends and neighbors that make a holiday what we’ve come to know it to be--now I’m without my partner and the boys’ dad.
Here is where I start to realize my need for perspective and realize I sound a bit like a whiner. My sister-in-law is without her partner and the daddy to her little boy and brand new baby girl. Plus he doesn’t get back next weekend, like Scott does. Such is the life of a soldier’s wife. I have a lot to be thankful for.

So, I’ve decided to hide the boys’ Easter baskets and print the clues on egg-shaped paper. There won’t be any plastic grass or Peeps, but they’ll love what I got them. I’m crap at omelets, but I am going to make deviled eggs. I may invite some folks over or ask if we can tag along. I’m not sure yet, but I’m trying not to worry. When Bridger and Caid realized that it was Easter on Sunday, B said, “We gotta make some plans! We need some decorations! Some good food. What do they eat here [in England] for Easter?” I smiled. There’s nothing like new traditions. And lucky, blessed me--I won’t be alone on a holiday.