Happy Easter, Happy Birthday!

Easter is my favorite holiday.  I don't decorate or make a special meal; I confess I am Domestically Challenged.  We decorate eggs and the Easter Bunny visits...but mostly my Easter Celebration is internal.  That celebration is significant though.

So knowing this you can better understand why several years ago when I was pregnant and my water broke on the eve of Easter, I was thrilled.  A baby born on Easter would be a wonderful way to celebrate Easter and all it means to me spiritually.  However, it was early and my body didn't want to "give up" the baby, so getting labor to start was a long process, labor was a slow, painful process...and right after midnight on Monday, my son was born.  Not only was it no longer Easter, but it was....April Fool's Day.  My son, who is old enough now to understand this finds it all very amusing...I still do not.

Amazingly, a few years later I found myself, once again, pregnant and being told "we need to get the baby out."  It was Easter Day and I was thrilled!  THIS time I would have my Easter Baby!  Who would have thought I would get a second chance?  But as mothers, midwives and doctors know, babies are unpredictable and once again my son was born shortly after midnight.  At least it wasn't April Fool's this time.

So fast forward a few years to today...Easter 2011.  Guess whose birthday it is today?  Mine!!!!

Isn't that amazing?  As you know Easter changes every year, and it doesn't usually "fall" this late in April.  And of course, each year our birthday's fall on a different day of the week...so I think I can safely say my birthday and Easter have never been on the same day before.

I would have considered this an amazing gift anytime, but especially after the Hellish year I have had,  the ups and downs I have had in my relationship with Christ (remember Stealing Guilt and more recently Palm Sunday...well it is simply incredible to me that THIS year of all years Easter would fall on my birthday.  I am in awe.

I am so pleased in fact that I am feeling a little mischievious. . .

Easter is about birth and death.  Which brings me to my next item on the agenda of today's post.  A good friend of mine and I used to write our own epitaphs for fun.  It was a macrabe way to relieve stress.  Last night, I was reminded of that and wrote this:

"Here lies Leslie:  Upon examination, doctors discovered that while she had been emotionally flatlined, and mentally derailed for sometime, what kept her heart beating was her family.  But in the end her physical heart also tired, slowed and stopped...however, her love for her family continues to grow and scientists are baffled."

Death is inevitable, and sometimes even may feel preferable to life, but because of Christ, we can all hope for a new birth, a new beginning.

Happy Easter!