Easter 2015

Easter has easily become one of my least favorite holidays.  Oddly enough, two years ago, it was one that I looked forward to very much.  Things change when you have a child versus suddenly not having one.

When I was pregnant with Preston, I dreamt of what Easter would be like.  I imagined us going to our local park for the annual Easter egg hunt.  While Preston would have been too small to care, I think he would have enjoyed the warmth of a Spring day, seeing other children, hearing them laugh, and of course, he would admire all the pretty colors.  Or he'd sleep, as he often did when we went for a walk with him in the stroller.

I supposed, I looked forward to Easter 2015 a little more than I did the one I'd anticipated to have last year.  This year, he would be walking around and able to pick things up.  It would have been oh-so special!!

The "would haves" are but distant dreams now.  I can only imagine what could have been.  Envisioning what life might have been like... sometimes it makes me smile and sometimes it makes me cry.  Through it all though, I'm thankful.  I have moments where I "see" Preston in a fantasy world.  Where he's just as I'd dreamed he'd be one day.  That being said, I try to not daydream too often.  I fear that making it a daily ritual could send me into a world filled with hallucinations and cause me to become down right delusional.  While part of me never wants to fully accept that he's gone, I know that he is.

And so, I only travel to a fantasy world every so often.  Most of all, on days when I know my little guy would have been all smiles and giggles.  I remember him for what he was, think of him how I think he would have been.  In those times I miss him, but I also feel him very close to me, and it makes the day, a little easier to bear.

This year, I imagined him trying to find his Easter basket at his Nan's house.  I dream that she would have hidden it somewhere low, and easy to find.  The excitement in his eyes when he finds it.  The little claps and giggles.

This year, as I was getting ready to leave to go to hubby's parents' house, I went to put on my necklace, the one I received from my aunt, uncle and cousins last Mother's Day.  I take it off every night and set it on Preston's urn.  It allows me to say good night and good morning to him every day.  As I picked it up on Sunday, there was a knot in it.  The second time in a month.  So odd... yet it feels like a little trick my sweet P might play on me - just to say, I'm here.  I'm always with you.

I hope the celebration of Easter was grand in Heaven.  I imagine it must be given that it marks the day Christ resurrected.  Perhaps there are no chocolate bunnies and Easter egg/basket hunts, but it must be such a happy day.  I hope to find out one day.