The Easter Alleluia

The long awaited Easter week/Spring Break is here! I was chatting with my friend G- whom I often mention in this blog since she is a fellow blogger and member of my women's group- on Holy Saturday about how this Lent wasn't perhaps the biggest success for us in terms of successful sacrificing. I remember last year just being so relieved that Lent was over because I had delved so much into my fasting.

This year, it has been an anticipating of Easter in a different way. Not just for Lent to be over, but so that the celebration and rememberance of the birthday/Triduum/Easter could begin!

I've already mentioned how Triduum turned out just as I had imagined it. I ended up going to the Easter Vigil at my parish on my own and then meeting up with my parents for Easter Sunday morning Mass. I was glad I went to the Vigil. It is my favorite part of the liturgical year for a reason. So much drama, so much meaning and symbolism. And we get to welcome new Catholics to the Church! I think that element of community is so important. I like to be a part of that Welcome Committee, if not the chairman ;)

Easter Sunday was spent with my parents and a childhood friend who happens to live in DC with his wife. The Easter eggs above are ones we dyed on Easter Sunday after Mass as part of a tradition his family has and my parents and I got to take part in this year. (My mom won the contest with her extra-special 'dinosaur egg' which you may be able to spot above ;)

I'm writing to you now from Florida after watching the Royal wedding (hence the random picture above. I'll get to it in a moment!). Our week has been mostly perfect with the exception of rain today (hence the blogging instead of beaching!) I've gotten to live my Easter Alleluia and my first week in my 30s in style: Beach/Pool by morning, lunch, then more pool or beach, then dinner, then hot-tub, then bed! I hope this routine is a foreshadowing of how my 30s are going to go ;)

My friend who is here with me and I are both single women and marvel at how God has blessed us with the ability to be down here in FL, take in sunsets and beautiful weather, and to be mostly stress free. While we certainly have moments where we watch the sunset and wish the other were perhaps a member of the opposite sex at that moment, we are grateful to be able to live the lives we have even if they don't include a husband or a baby to include in our Facebook profile picture at this time.

We are staying at a place that has mostly retire-ees or 'snow birds' down here for the winter. They are cute and do their water aerobics by day, dinner and dancing by night. One night in particular this week, they were throwing a huge bash! My friend and I were in the pool for the sunset and we could see and hear all the old folks dancing to Sinatra (and even Johnny Cash! win!).

We had what my other friends E and L like to call "ovary-exploding" moments- moments where the cuteness and our feminine sides just overwhelm us. We swoon and can't control the coos and awwwws of the overwhelming adorableness happening before our eyes. I try to be tough, but the old couples dancing to tunes asking if they could "have this dance for the rest of their lives" was just too much. I had to remove myself from the situation and get another cocktail stat.

Watching the Royal Wedding now isn't helping 'the situation', perhaps. I mean, Prince William was every girl my age's dreamboat! We had pictures taped up into our lockers, etc, etc. Now throw in Alexander McQueen dresses and this is easily any girl's dream if I can make such a generalization.

Like the old couples dancing the night away, though,the Royal Wedding makes me think of the serious commitments these couples are making for each other for the rest of their lives. And that life long commitment can be just the thing to keep those ovaries in check. I mean, together for life is a LONG. TIME. When I think about it: Queen Elizabeth is still keeping it real on the royal throne. Then it's Charles, THEN Kate and Prince William will get to do their thing IF they are still together! (which is a horrible thing to say, but Charles and the late Diana couldn't even keep the fairy tale for too long.) There. The ovaries are deflating now.

And so quickly I become more like a dude. Guys are stereotypically more afraid of these life-long commitments while we women tend to dream of it. Clearly, a nice realistic approach to life and romance and its challenges is probably the best way to look at marriage. Not with an ovary based bias or lack their of.

I know I've talked way too much about lady parts in this blog post and I apologize. A week with cute old couples and sunsets will do that to you...if you are a girl, I suppose.

Back to my old cyncical self next week I promise you! AS for now, the sun looks like it may come out today! Imma turn this fairy tale mess off the TV and get back to the reality that IS my life as a fabulous single Catholic teacher on Spring Break! Huzzah!

To the life long promises and the freedoms given to us by God no matter our state in life-

Happy Easter!
Peace,
Julia