missing my original Easter Bunny

I posted this earlier, but this was the scene when I popped out to the Castro for a haircut last week:


I took this pic with my iPhone and edited while waiting for a chair with the new, very cool iPhoto app for iOS. I sent this pic to my Mom.

She wrote back earlier this week saying, "I love it! You look do much like Dad with that Bunny. - same smile, same humor..." I miss Dad a lot, and loved hearing that, but the reminder also brought everything back to the surface again. I really can't imagine how hard it is for Mom, who has never lived alone and has been in love with Dad since she was 19. For her, every day and every thing is a reminder of what is lost, and I don't think I could bear that.

Thinking of Dad on Easter I am reminded of my favorite Dad-at-Easter story. We got pretty awesome Easter back sets growing up. Nothing fancy or over the top, but stealthily placed baskets with some chocolates, plastic eggs—some filled with jelly beans and some filled with coins—and generally a small toy. Not Christmas, but springtime excitement and a morning surprise left by an equally magical benefactor.

And the Easter egg hunts—Dad was good at those, and the side yard was perfect for that. Mac always found the Golden Egg. Every friggin' year.  I'm still a little frustrated at that.

As we grew older and into adults, there were younger kids for Papa John to hide eggs for, and he enthusiastically did so. Dad also had a separate "Easter egg hunt" for the young adults/grown ups: strategically placed mini bottles of booze. Love my Dad.

One year the weather on Easter Sunday was less a lesson on the resurrection and more a lesson on Noah's Arc. Dad creatively hid the eggs for the kids around the living room. And he hosted another hunt for the adults in the library (what other people might call a den). Both were much fun, but here's the thing: it's not like Dad had a map or a count of the liquor bottles.

For years afterwards we would find a random mini-bottle of bourbon or vodka squirreled away in an obscure part of the library. I was having people over one night and as we visited in the library, a guest put her hand between the sofa cushions and produced a tiny bottle of Jack Daniels. She looked first puzzled then seriously concerned. She thought one of my parents had been hiding liquor around the house, which I suppose was in fact true, but not in the way she suspected.

In hushed tones she asked, "Wilson...does your Dad have a drinking problem?"
Me, laughing, "Oh no...that's just from Easter."

It then occurred to me that my answer, while also true, must have sounded like a non-sequitur, leading her to think that perhaps I was the one with the problem.

I believe it was this day that I adopted my policy: Never explain.

Great is the mystery of our faith.