The Boy Gets an Easter Basket

It's an Easter bag, actually. Cute and pink, sporting a big bunny head with a sparkly nose. The Boy is entranced by the pink, sparkly pictures in his That's Not My Mermaid book, and I see nothing wrong with this fact, so when I spotted the sparkly pink felt Easter bag at Target, I grabbed it.

It fit perfectly into how I imagined The Boy's first cognizant Easter would go. I pictured him playing with baby rabbits in a sun-dappled field. He would wear a shirt with a collar and no wrinkles and little man-pants. His hair would be abundant enough to be gelled into a movie star handsome do.

Plainly I watched too many J.C. Penny Easter commercials during the days before I got TiVo and began skipping commercials entirely.

Still, I had high hopes for Easter morning as I snuck his bag of Easter goodies and Hubby's token chocolate bunny onto the mantel. I had baked Easter cookies that afternoon, and Hubby was even talking about dying Easter eggs.

Then, at 10:30 Saturday night came the cry of a boy who has eaten too many of said Easter cookies. He arched. He yelled. He stared pleadingly at me with tear-swollen eyes, begging me for more Tylenol, please.

Hubby took his cue and headed for the daybed in the office.

I arranged pillows around the bed and removed The Boy's sleep sac so he could cuddle under the covers with me for the night. Which plainly meant it was breakfast time.

I spent about an hour trying to convince him otherwise, but in the end The Boy and I had a fine time playing in the living room at 2 a.m. as I caught up on old episodes of Eli Stone. Eventually, we headed back to bed, drunk on the novelty of doing what so many normal people do late on a Saturday night.

The difference between us is that The Boy was happy to rise before 8, secure in the notion that a nap would be waiting whenever his late-night revelry caught up with him. I, on the other hand, working with 5 1/2 hours of sleep and the unfamiliar sensation of drinking lots of red wine and not brushing my teeth before going to bed, was not quite ready to greet Easter morning.

By all accounts, Hubby and The Boy had a lovely Easter morning while I stayed in bed. Then I anchored the play -- excuse me, living room while Hubby banged about in the kitchen making an omelet for me and pancakes for him and The Boy. Which were almost ready for the griddle when The Boy's late-night revelry did in fact catch up to him.

Hubby and I ate our Easter brunch a little guiltily, watched over by The Boy's empty chair and the goodies still crowding the mantle.

He awakened from a good long nap after 3. Perhaps not the traditional time for hunting Easter eggs -- and we had none to hunt since no one had been up to making them -- but still with plenty of daylight left, thanks to the ridiculously early onset of daylight savings.

My sunny Easter scenario, however, was still doomed, as the ample sunlight was a poor match for the arctic winds sweeping across our yard. The Boy, it seemed, would receive his first Easter basket in our living room wearing jeans and a stained South Bay Cardinals baseball shirt.

Still excited, I beckoned him to the mantle. "Give this to Daddy," I instructed, handing him a bag of foil-wrapped chocolate eggs.

Off he set, throwing his feet in outward-reaching arcs as he baby-walked his way to his father and proffered the gift.

I called him back and handed him a chocolate bunny. "Give this to Daddy," I said.

Warming to the game, he wobbled around the stroller and placed the chocolate bunny in his Daddy's hands.

"One more!" I called. It was getting more difficult to rouse him, but I managed to coax him back to deliver a final Easter treat to his father, as well as a bag of blue tennis balls for the dogs.

Too late I realized that, although our camera remains in Charleston (or wherever the thief has taken it), we do have a video camera. How could I have failed to record the unparalleled sight of my 15-month-old son making his determined and unsteady way to his father proudly bearing Easter gifts?

I grabbed the camera and reclaimed the chocolate bunny, then resumed my place by the mantel.

"Sweetie," I cried. "One more!"

He gazed at me with a quizzical look. Hadn't he already delivered all the Easter gifts? That bunny looked suspiciously familiar.

"I need you to bring this to Daddy," I urged.

He made his way over and trustingly held out his hands. I plopped the bunny in them and began videotaping his knees, reasoning that once he began walking toward his father he would fit into the frame and our loved ones would understand why we had sent them this video clip.

Only the knees didn't move out of the frame.

I put down the camera. The Boy gravely shoved the chocolate bunny back at me, somewhat hurt that I had abused his trust in this manner.

"Wait, no, bring it to Daddy," I entreated, once again filming his knees as they backed out of sight. He didn't even make it into the frame because I was too busy pointing the camera at the floor as I waved the chocolate bunny enticingly at him.

We have no video of our child on Easter. You will have to imagine the rest yourself.

I took The Boy's Easter bag off the mantle and sat on the floor with him and Hubby. He was busy taking the dogs' tennis ball away from Lilah as she stared at him with a combination of hope that he would throw it for her and annoyance that he plainly wasn't going to.

"Give Lilah her ball," I suggested. "And see what's in your Easter bag."

The Boy glanced over. Apparently the pink sparkly things in his That's Not My Mermaid book are better than the bag bunny's sparkly, pink nose. With a gesture of indifference, he turned his attention back to the blue tennis ball.

"It ought to say 'Tennis Balls for Little Boys,'" Hubby offered unhelpfully, pointing to the tag that read 'Tennis Balls for Dogs,' presumably to avoid extreme disappointment when a human being tried to actually use them in a game of tennis.

We did eventually convince The Boy to show some interest in his Easter bag. Mostly by taking the blue tennis balls away. For his own good, we assured him as he wailed.

The wind-up chick did quiet him down, though I suspect his silence was more indicative of terror than fascination, as the chick hopped across the leather couch. He liked the wind-up rabbit that poops jelly beans more, but we ruined it by snatching away the jelly beans as they fell, muttering, "Choking hazard," as if that information would comfort him. He did find the bunny ears kind of a good joke, but I was too wise to try to videotape him wearing them. A camera would have come in quite handy.

I did make one big score. The organic gummy fruit heaped at the bottom of his bag was a big hit, once he figured out how to chew it. Of course, I took them away once he'd had three or four and ate the rest myself.

"Why only three?" our neighbor asked a little while later when The Boy and I were out visiting their dogs.

I had thought the answer was obvious when she bemoaned trying to get her sugar-crazed daughter down for a much needed nap. Yet somehow at the moment she asked, that answer vanished, sucked away by the realization of what Easter is.

Easter is not a time for well scrubbed young children to daintily drop purple and yellow Easter eggs into beribboned baskets. It is not a day when any parent in her right mind would adopt a fuzzy baby rabbit just for the chance to see her offspring cuddling it against a milky cheek.

No, Easter, I now realize, is a day when I must let my child eat straight high fructose corn syrup thinly disguised as Peeps until it comes out his ears. It is the day when my child will teach me that, contrary to popular belief, chocolate has just as much caffeine as coffee, at least if you eat enough of it.

Forget about resurrection and rebirth and spring springing after a long winter.

Easter is the day when I am reminded to let go and let him eat junk food and watch my boy grow up.