Easter Joy

A few weeks ago I called me up my best friend.  She moved to Toronto a few years ago and I have missed her something fierce ever since.

We had a long chat, as we usually do when we manage to connect by phone. It was like the high school days, when we would spend all day together at school then go home only to get on the phone and chat the rest of the night, doing homework together, watching our favorite shows together, breaking only briefly to eat dinner because both our mamas number one dinner rule was no phones at the table.

It felt so good to talk to her, to debrief everything that's been going on in our lives over the last weeks, to gossip a little bit, vent and advise. It's what best friends are for, and despite our distance everytime I hear her voice on that phone I feel like we're right back where we started - inseparable.

This last time, we were talking about various things and at one point she interrupted one of my monologues to say: "Don't ever let anyone steal your joy." It seemed so simple hearing her say it, and I have been thinking about this every day since. No one has the right to make you feel bad about how happy you are feeling, no one has the power to take that happiness, the fulfillment you have in your life, the satisfaction you feel, away from you. Right then an there I decided that nobody was gonna stomp on my joy.

And this Easter weekend nobody even came close.

We dyed eggs, which is an interesting project with a two year old.  Suffice it to say most of the blue bowl ended up on Nana's kitchen chairs. Did I feel bad?

Yep.  Did it steal my egg dying joy?

Nope.

 

We made Easter nests.  They were good.

The Easter Bunny tracked my boy down at his Nana and Grandpa's house, and it goes without saying that Jake was very happy about that.  

 

This was really the first year he could soak up the joys of Easter. The anticipation, the treats, the thrill of the hunt. 

And for a boy who never knew what an Easter Egg hunt was before this weekend I'd say he took to it like a fish to water.  

 

 

Last week I took five days off to be with my family, and I enjoyed each one. I soaked up every ray out out of life, lapped up every last ounce of goodness because don't I know it's fleeting. 

Even the one dark cloud of the weekend that hovered over us briefly during our visit to a local beach couldn't steal my joy.

Not even a little bit.