Many years ago, MC's ancient neighbor, Mrs. L., took her aside to impose order on what she saw as MC's haphazard observance of holidays. "Look," said Mrs. L. "You've got to pick a Christmas gift food. Like these cream cheese pecan tarts. You have to do the same thing every year." Then I'm sure we smoked menthol cigarettes while she showed me the recipe. It pains MC to report that, fresh out of graduate school, she mentally shuddered at the folksiness of Christmas gift foods (delivered while wearing a tacky holiday sweater, she was sure), and consequently did not file the pecan tart recipe. She's still doing her holidays free-form, and she's paying for it. Mrs. L knew, for example, that a sane person takes down her Christmas lights on Epiphany, and that she drinks gin and tonic when she hands out Halloween candy. Where some might see rigidity, others might find comfort and consistency. Do the Jews reinvent how to sit shiva every time someone dies? Doh.Significant and insignificant rituals exist for a reason. If MC had developed a functional Easter ritual, she would know how to boil eggs without cracking five per dozen. Instead, her seat-of-the-pants troubleshooting plan is to construct egg salad out of the ruins. With a working knowledge of PAAS products and eye-dying mechanics, she could have foreseen that Cranky #2 would pluck eggs out of dye cups with her fingers and might have a clue about the staying power of egg dye. Instead, the Crankies have a household full of egg salad; how long C2 will have purple cuticles is anybody's guess.
In the cruel month of April, Eliot claims, memory mixes with desire. Heretofore, the Crankies have emphasized the desire part of the equation. C2, channeling the organized German side of her DNA, may push the needle in the other direction. A tremendous memory and a drive for uniformity may be the one thing needful for successful egg boiling. By Easter 2011, C2 ought to be able to read eHow.com and the instructions on the back of the PAAS box. If that's the case, you can bet we'll get a set of protocols.
--MC
Mrs. L. was so world-wise. I'll spot you the pecan tart recipe, if you'll ante up the gin and tonic. Yes, we're thinking along similar lines about the gravity of our positions: How did we come to be the standard bearers of the rituals to be viewed as What We Do for Holidays?
ReplyDeleteBless little Cranky #2, if she can set up the egg-dye next year. We'll be there with the mustard and mayo to make the salad. Or, as in our household, the deviled eggs.
XOXO
What is it about Easter egg dyeing that brings out the German in those girls? I can remember having to take a deep breath, put down my wire egg dipper, and calmly inform Cranky #1, probably age 5, that there certainly was more than one way to dye a freakin' egg and to please keep her fingers out of my dye. Sheesh. Yet, at X-mas, those girls will hang any shiny piece of plastic crap on a synthetic tree. There is no explaining the rituals we cherish. love zia
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