I went Easter egg hunting with granddaughter Julia, age 3. Our hunt was an unscheduled outing, an outing at Julia’s insistence. The hunt was over the Labor Day weekend just past.
Timing a little off, you suggest?
First, a little background. Our family celebrated Easter this year at our little weekend place on the lake. If you recall, that Sunday in early April was warm and sunny and a good day for an egg hunt. And we had one, for Julia.
That day Julia’s Uncle Jeff accepted the roll as the official Easter Bunny and placed plastic eggs in the front yard for Julia to find. Oh the eggs were so easy to spot I winced when I surveyed the yard. As assistant bunny I suggested alternate and less obvious spots. I even meddled a tad further and rearranged some of the most obvious eggs.
I got voted down. I returned the eggs back to where I found them.
And so Julia had a pretty easy time of it that brisk, sunny April Sabbath. She took her little straw basket, scampered about the postage stamp bit of a yard – and she cleaned up – got every one of those bright colored plastic eggs with little surprises hidden inside.
And that was that – or so we thought.
Fast forward to Labor Day.
Julia was back again to the lake place for a visit with the grandparents. She had but barely bounded out of the family van when she announced to me her intentions:
“I’m going to go Easter egg hunting.”
The calendar had already shifted to September, so I fumbled for words.
“Oh sorry honey that will have to wait till next year, oh that will be fun.”
Julia was having none of it and took me by my hand.
“Let’s go,” she insisted.
And off we went, scouring the front yard where she had so easily found the eggs before.
“We’re hunting Easter eggs,” I announced to my neighbor Kathy who happened by on the driveway. “We might have a rough time of it,” I added with a shrug.
Julia and I scoured the front yard, we paced the side yard. We looked in bushes, we checked behind gutters.
But as we turned the corner to the back of the house, there, in the bright light of a warming September sun, three brightly colored plastic eggs lay tucked and positioned and hidden in plain site for us to find.
“There they are,” Julia shouted with expectant delight.
The eggs were thanks to good neighbor Kathy who, upon hearing of our quest, had raced into her home, grabbed some “left-overs” and went to work as the Labor Day Rabbit, the distant cousin to the Easter Bunny.
And so for a moment, the impossible yielded to the marvelous and it was Easter on Labor Day and earth and humanity glistened in the eyes of young and old alike.
The experience got me to thinking of how life is a play being constantly written. And I considered all the roles we might play: sibling for some, friends for others, spouse, child, parent, elder, leader, and follower. Our assignments as cast members then are constantly changing, our scripts and dialogues all fresh in the making.
We each have the starring role in our own life. That is a given. It is by nature’s design.
And we each have the opportunity to be the best supporting actor or actress in the lives of family and friends and of those we love. That role is by choice and an honor to fulfill.
But there are lesser roles for each of us to be cast in each and every day. Good substantial roles, some of them are, to teach or encourage or assist. But some are walk-on parts, total voluntary cast assignments to cheer or to comfort, to aid or to abet.
A September rabbit posing as the Easter Bunny showed me that wonder is alive and well and that some supporting rolls are just too good to pass up