April
05
Bunny Prints
At last. Easter. What must it have been like to discover the body of Jesus had disappeared? Although there are so many wonderful writings about that morning, my memories of Easter morning always remind me, oddly, of my late mother in law, Connie Kerr. The first Easter I spent with her Bill and I were caring for her following a long and very serious hospitalization related to emphysema. She had only 16% of her lung capacity left even though she was only 58 at the time. Her bedroom was on the second floor of her old home. She was able to come downstairs once a day, on a good day, but that was it. It wiped her out. Bill and I would typically take her breakfast upstairs each morning because mornings were hard for her breathing.
Connie was raised Catholic but was an atheist when she died. On Easter morning 1996, a few months before we would marry, I was the first one downstairs and wanted to make Connie a nice breakfast before Bill and I left for church. As I turned the corner into the kitchen I noticed little white marks on the floor near the back door. They looked as though a cat had stepped in flour and made prints across the floor. Later I took Connie’s breakfast up to her. She was doing a breathing treatment with her nebulizer so I waited until she was done. I said, “There’s some little white marks on the floor in the kitchen. I’m trying to figure out how they got there.” Still breathless, she uttered, “Bunny prints,” gasped again and then finished her thought. “The Easter Bunny must have come.” Then she smiled. “Did you go downstairs last night by yourself after we went to bed?!” I asked incredulously. She nodded and smiled broadly.
My eyes welled up because I knew how much energy that involved for her and that she had done that for me. I couldn’t believe as frail as she was that she had been able to lean over to make these prints on the floor! She didn’t believe in Easter but she knew I did. Every year since I have sprinkled flour in paw patterns at our back door to remember that morning. Sophie loved them as a little child and enjoys seeing them even as a teen.
Happy Easter my friends. Alleluia.
Happy Easter to you and yours Weeks. Today our pastor reminded us to take our “alleluia” with us throughout the days, a powerful tool on the bad days and a wonderful reminder on the good.
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Thank you for all of your posts during Holy Week. They were beautiful and were lovely to read each morning. And I love the Bunny Prints – what a great story. You must have meant so much to your mother-in-law
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Thank you so much Carol. It’s hard to know as I met her and got to know her only when she was very, very sick. I think it was hard, as someone who had become a widow suddenly when her husband was 53, to lose her health as her son was preparing to marry. But if you were to ask me of which accomplishment in my life I am most proud it would be the years I spent caring for my late mother-in-law. I miss her so much. She would have been so happy to know Sophie and see how our business has grown. I’m glad you enjoyed my Holy Week posts.
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This story tells me that while perhaps her logical brain had lost faith in God and Easter, that God and Easter were still caring for her, through your hands, and in the joy she still found in giving up to the end!
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I truly think she was the one screening her calls from God by listening every time her called but not wanting to pick up. On numerous occasions she would say things like,”I feel as though I’ve been carried through this whole ordeal,” but she would say when she was in the hospital and the chaplain would come by, “You’re wasting your time on me.” By that point we had been her caregivers for 5 months full-time and she wanted very much to do something for us and that was what she could do. I’m still amazed 19 yrs later than she thought to do that.
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