Happy Easter to all who celebrate, and to those who don't Happy Chocolate Rabbit and Chocolate Egg season! Either way, here's a couple stories to place in your Easter basket or non-denominational rainbow colored carrying container:
Frances Bryce
03.28.2019
What Shall I Wear Today?
I read that early memories (maybe the earliest that affected our later life has a connection. I recalled an occasion that I never forgot. It was imprinted on my brain even to today and choices I make about selection clothes, and what I wear today.
The memory, I am using today affect that part of my earliest memory.
My best friend and I attended church on most Sundays, but Easter Sunday was a special day when we had new outfits. That Easter Sunday, I did not get a new outfit, and that was not a happy day for me. My friend arrived at my home which was nearer to the church and we usually went together. She had on her new outfit of a yellow sweater, brown plaid skirt, saddle oxford yellow socks. I wore my old clothes, that I don’t remember what they were, but I do remember that they were not new.
Today, I am aware that my selection is done with care, and what I buy has to have the proper selection, so that I either have in my wardrobe something that complete the purchase or that I complete the purchase at the point when I buy what I need, so that I don’t have a skirt, without a blouse or sweater. I follow that rule when I shop. The other thing I find myself doing is often selecting what I am going to wear, and maybe change my mind but sometimes finally with the first thing I try on.
I do not follow fads, but am keenly aware what I think fits be best when choosing to add to my wardrobe. I can connect this to one of the earliest memories that connect to clothes and the choices I make.
Finally what I am wearing today is the third selection before leaving my house. I do not do this as a daily routine, but often enough to see the connection.
Delores Wilson
04.25.2019
Crime Doesn't Pay
Mysteriously my mother would be off every Easter Monday. She would give us the choice to stay home or go to school. It was supposed to be an extended Easter holiday, however Mom kept us busy from 9 o’clock until noon. Then we would eat a hearty lunch she had prepared for us. After lunch, she kept us busy until 3’o clock. I was in high school, and I had begun to learn the routine. As usual my mom would ask if we wanted to go to school or stay home. I told her that I was going to school- my girlfriend and I had decided we were going to hooky. It was the first time for both of us. Our friend who had graduated ahead of us was in the working place but was off from work that Easter Monday. When we arrived at her house she had breakfast ready. After we ate she answered our questions about her new job, and we watched the boring morning television shows until 1:00. The oddest thing, I felt convicted. I would have rather stayed home with my mom with permission. True, my mom would have kept us busy and gave us a hearty lunch. I had heard and seen students hooky, and I thought such a waste of time. I knew within myself that was the first and last time I would hooky from school.
Ann von Dehsen
04.25.2019
Easter Memories
My childhood Easter memories included Baskets filled with chocolate bunnies and jelly beans, brightly colored eggs about to transform into egg salad, dresses with petticoats that rustled when you moved, church service filled with sweet smelling flowers & sweet smelling mothers with conflicting perfume scents resulting in lots of sneezes.
But my biggest Easter memory, for better or worse, is going to Easter dinner at Uncle Howards and Aunt Mary Margarets. Howard was my fathers half brother more than 20 years his senior. He was the wealthy relative who worked on Wall Street, lived in a high rise apartment with lots of oriental rugs and enjoyed cigars and women, & liquor. Aunt Mary Margaret was Howards 4th wife much to the chagrin of my mother and other aunts who were still very fond of wife #3, Mona, currently working as a waitress in NYC.
Now Uncle Howard never had children and although he was pleasant to my sister, me, and our 2 girl cousins upon our Easter arrival it was obvious that he was not entirely comfortable. Aunt Mary Margaret (MM for short) made no attempt to talk to us beyond “hello, girls” as she ushered us into the t.v. room, turned the t.v. on to Roller Derby handed us a basket of jelly bean-filled Easter eggs & cracked a smile as she shut the door behind her. None of us had any aspirations to compete in the roller derby occupying the tv screen, so we were forced to consider other forms of entertainment. Our favorite activity was to write, “help! we are being held captive in apt 4c!” on strips of paper placed in the plastic eggs & dropping them out the window to the courtyard below. If anyone found our message in this day and age a swat team probably would have shown up, but we never received any response to our messages.
We also did our share of snooping, and one year we hit pay dirt – as we pulled a box from the closet filled with Playboy magazines. As we flipped thru those pages, we were shocked, appalled, somewhat disgusted and quite intimidated and concerned over own lack of development so far. Overall, it was a horribly unhealthy and unrealistic way to begin our sexual development, but it sure filled up the time!
When we heard MM’s high heels clicking down the hall, we quickly slid the box under the table. She arrived with t.v. trays adorned w/ her yearly canned pear bunny salad & pre portioned Easter dinner.
We were too young to appreciate the irony of eating our bunny salad as studied the playmate bunnies.
We knew our visit was coming to an end when we were summoned into the dining room to actually join the adults for dessert – (MM’s traditional egg shaped vanilla cake decorated with jelly beans). This was also about the time that Uncle Howard's many martinis became apparent as he began commenting on his sister-in-laws gorgeous legs & cleavage. So before you knew it we were on our way home, free from Howard & MM for another year.
If you want to transcribe for Best Day, then email us at info@bestdayofmylifesofar.org. You can also share our older buds' adventures by donating to Best Day, subscribing to our newsletter, sending a note to our older buds, or following us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. And if you or the older buds have Easter stories, then you or they can submit stories through our portal right here. We're especially interested to stories from Black older buds, but we're always looking for stories from older buds of color, older buds with disabilities, LGBTQIA+ older buds, older buds of any gender or sex, older buds of any religion, and older buds who just plain break the mold.
And don't forget to maintain contact with the older buds in your life. If you can't be there in person, please call them, email them, or message them on social media. And if they're using teleconferencing or remote events for the first time, give them a call and help them set things up. Check in on them to see how well they're getting used to these programs. Buy them a computer or an internet package if they don't have one of their own. It's a human right, after all.
Curated by Caitlin Cieri