Sunday, March 23, 2008

Easter Blessings by Angie Ledbetter

What a beautiful day it is. It doesn't matter if it's snowing, raining, or so windy you wouldn't want to go outside. Good weather is just a bonus for an already wonderful day. As it happens, it's lovely in the South with the azaleas showing their pride for over a week now. Usually after just a few days, their purple, pink and snowy white heads have been knocked off by a rainstorm or that last freeze, but not this year. You can hardly find a street without the great blobs of bright color decorating at least a few yards.

What makes this day exceptionally lovely is almost everyone is off work and home for the Easter holidays. Two of my kids are traveling the country, enjoying time away from school and the 3-day moratorium on school and sport activities. And I'm not grading papers or preparing lesson plans since I have the whole week off.

I've visited with my parents, then enjoyed the delicious Louisiana Cajun tradition of boiled crawfish on Good Friday with other family members. But those are just minor benefits of being released from normally scheduled things I "gotta do."

The best thing about today is remembering the reason why I'm celebrating it. For Christians, Easter is the biggest event of the year. Christmas tends to want to overshadow it with all its commercialism, tinsel-covered trees, shopping, partying, and such, but it never really can. Today we remember the suffering Christ accepted for each of us. I'm grateful for one more attempt at struggling to walk in His footsteps, to give thanks for His ultimate sacrifice, and to rejoice again that He has risen.

Happy Easter Sunday, and may each of you be given baskets full of grace and all good things.

6 comments:

Kathryn Magendie said...

Happy Easter, friend.

Barbara Quinn said...

It was a gorgeous day here in NY too. Happy Easter. Now I'm going to put my feet up and watch John Adams.

Unknown said...

In Saratoga Springs it was cooold, about 35 degrees. For the natives that was a lovely spring day. Everything is relative.

Mary Ann Ledbetter said...

Angie,
Happy Easter to you and yours.

Thank you for another beautiful article, one that shimmers with love and goodness. You remind us so subtly of the reason we celebrate this day--Resurrection.

Yes, how grateful to be able to report another Easter dinner with my almost ninety-year-old Mom, with a sister, with a niece (my goddaughter), with my husband. An unusual, laughter-filled dinner at Piccadilly Cafeteria! No hours of food prep. No clean-up afterward. Instead, a long, giggly time together when everything seemed hilarious, especially the old Acadian family tales told by my Mom. How grateful I am to be reminded that my cousins buried their mother not only with purse on arm, a la The Golden Girls, but with tons of gum inside. Rose, you see, was a chewing gum addict. How grateful I am for the howls of laughter from our table as Mildred (my Mom)re-told the story. You cannot make up anything that funny. Oh, and more tales and more laughing fits. Mother, you see, is completely blind, and I was supposed to be assisting her with her broccoli rice and her carrot souffle, also her sweet tea. What with the general hoo-hah at the table, I'd forget to feed her, all the while my sister protesting, "She can feed herself!" Mildred's answer? "That was when the plates were full. Now I need the help."

I've been informed that I'm as of now fired from my job as assistant. Apparently, I talked too much and shoveled food too slowly. Oh, how grateful for a Mom radiant in a fresh hair-do and glowing with mental alertness. Thank you, sweet Jesus, especially this Easter Day.

Thank you, also, for my Ledbetter relatives. Angie, your blog entries get me up and going; they remind me of my blessings.

Love,
MA

MyrnaMckee said...

Please Post Have enjoyed you and am grateful for you help for 7 years Happy Day Bubbs

Anonymous said...

"I'm grateful for one more attempt at struggling to walk in His footsteps, to give thanks for His ultimate sacrifice, and to rejoice again that He has risen."

Amen...!

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