Meanderin’ along on an EGG-ceptional morning.

I was up with the chickens this morning in anticipation of a long and leisurely walk at Council Point Park on a glorious Spring morning.  And, speaking of chickens, while eating breakfast, I was amused by an interview on WJR between Warren Pierce and a local farmer who rents out baby chicks for Easter.  You simply show up at his stall at Eastern Market today and fifty bucks will get you a pair of three-day old chicks and a cage, bedding and food for two weeks.  He says that you’re free to keep the critters forever, but generally the novelty of Easter chicks wears out in about two weeks, at which time you return them and the cage.  He’ll give you a voucher for a dozen of eggs to be redeemed at his stall at Eastern Market come Fall by which time your very own chicks would have grown into egg-laying hens.  Quite a concept!  But, truthfully – it’s just better to buy your kids Peeps and risk cavities versus boredom I would think.  And, while we’re discussing feathered friends, I held my breath as I walked outside this morning and absolutely no robin shenanigans had transpired.  Whew!  Do you think they finally got the message?  If they did, then truly they are not the birdbrains that people say they are.   

Before I left the house, I stuffed the big cargo pockets in my worn Winter coat with a fresh Ziploc bag of peanuts on one side, and slipped the digital camera into the other and toted along the rest of the loaf of bread for the ducks.  I set out for Council Point Park bright and early, and what a beautiful, but nippy morning, it was.  We could not ask for more perfect weather for this holiday weekend, could we?  When I arrived, the Park was already crowded with many walkers and joggers on the pathway.  As I walked along, the trees just erupted with birdsong and I must have heard at least ten different warbles and whistles while passing beneath them, and it made me feel good to be out enjoying the morning.  I realized I should consult my bird call website to try to identify the many twitters, tweets and warbles I heard before my next visit to the Park.  I saw a beautiful red-winged blackbird who sang loud and  long, either calling to its mate, or just because it was a beautiful sunny day.   

With camera in tow, and clutching my bag of crumbled-up wheat bread, I waited on the mallards, but they were nowhere to be found today, and, in fact I never even saw ripples in the water indicating they were swimming noiselessly downstream.  I brought my bread home with me and will try again tomorrow.  I secretly suspect that the mallards knew of the impending holiday and they ducked under the storm sewer drain in case anyone is pondering a nice roast duck rather than the traditional ham for tomorrow’s Easter dinner. 

Occasionally I stopped to toss a few peanuts to the squirrels who scampered over to see me.  They kept nosing around my ankles and I tried to get their picture from that vantage point, but, first I had to fumble to remove my gloves, grab the camera, then shake out some peanuts - they soon lost interest and ambled off, so to entice them back, I tossed some peanuts at my feet and they came back lickety-split.  I’m such a soft touch, but next time, I’ll make then work for those peanuts:  no treat ‘til you pose for me! 

I walked along companionably with several of the walkers I had met last year and we all commented how wonderful the weather was and how good it was to get back into our respective walking regimens.  As I suspected, some of the stalwart walkers told me that, try as they might, the Park paths were simply too snowy and icy to walk during the course of this past Winter.  They turned to mall walking instead, warm and slick-free, while being mindful to steer clear of the tantalizing whiffs of fresh coffee and goodies which assailed their nostrils near the Food Court.

As I walked home, the wind kicked up a tad, so I zipped up my coat higher, so it was like a turtleneck, and though the April sun was strong, it felt more like a late March day.  I’m sure the decorated hard-boiled eggs can safely be hidden around the yard tomorrow without fear of food poisoning, lest they don’t get discovered right away.  There weren’t many homes decorated with an Easter or Spring motif – perhaps most people thought we’d never get past the wicked Winter and couldn’t put themselves into “Spring or Easter mode”.  What I mostly saw were huge bunnies adorning doors or over-sized decorated eggs in living room windows.  My mom never decorated Easter eggs for me; instead, she shared the love by baking bunny-shaped sugar cookies and festive cupcakes, and this ritual continued for many years after I was a kid.  My grandmother, however, got into the whole egg-dying fun, but not like you’d think.  She would collect flimsy onion peels for months, then boil them up with a few dozen eggs.  Well, those eggs were indeed dyed, though not in the prettiest pastels with decorations resembling dots and zigzags, but the effort for her granddaughter was made with love and appreciated.  She never hid those butterscotch-colored eggs in her backyard, but piled them into a big dish inside the fridge, to either help yourself or she would use them to make egg salad sandwiches.  We’d always go to Toronto to visit my grandmother for Easter dinner and along with the those hard-boiled eggs, my grandmother would make me up an Easter basket as well.  She’d dump out the contents of her worn wicker sewing basket into a plastic bag, then line it with a couple of pretty, lace-edged hankies.  Voila … a pretty Easter basket.  I usually got a tall chocolate bunny from Eaton’s in the middle of the basket and a few “Golden Books” with animal themes tucked in between the bunny and buried in the Easter grass.  There was never alot of candy, and back in those days, we didn’t have gooey marshmallow treats like Peeps or Cadbury eggs  and I can’t ever remember chewing on chocolate-covered marshmallow bunnies.  My Easter basket from my parents was similarly devoid of high-sugar treats like jelly beans.  I usually got a foil-wrapped rabbit and a box of Laura Secord pastel-colored chocolate suckers.  Dancing along the edge of my Easter basket were tiny chenille chickens, who were attached by their wire feet and they encircled the entire basket.  My parents were loving, but practical.  I usually got a new Easter outfit for church and many pictures in the old photo album, were of me strutting around in a new coat and hat, a frilly dress which peeked out beneath the coat and new black patent leather shoes and bright-white knee socks.  I would have to model my new clothes before I left for Sunday school.  Those Easter days somehow seem like eons ago.   I hope your Easter is special and leaves you filled with enough warm memories to last a lifetime.

You can catch up on my blog posts before I started blogging at Patch by going here:  http://lindaschaubblog.net/