I just saw a very cute little boy in the elevator (yes, today I acknowledged the existence of a child, something I try to avoid if at all possible) who was grinning bashfully when addressed by the other elevator occupants but miraculously came to life when questioned about the Easter bunny. It was very sweet.

I’m not sure if I ever really believed in the Easter bunny or whether or not I even cared (just so long as the goodies were there when I woke up). Though I do remember feeling slightly panicked when I was very young and my Uncle Jim told me that if the Easter bunny tried to come into the house he would shoot him, but he said the same thing about Santa on Christmas Eve and everything turned out ok. Having older sisters really didn’t help with the whole ‘believing in mythical characters that leave gifts on holidays’ phenomenon anyway. I still remember them pointing out the Cabbage Patch dolls painstakingly hidden in the linen closet a week before Christmas.

I was a bit of a cynical little kid anyway. Sure, I believed that my stuffed elephant could fly, but in real life magic seemed to sort of muck things up. For instance, I once had a bag of uncooked black beans that I loved to play with, count, sort, pour in and out of various things, stick my hands into, that sort of thing. Don’t ask me where I got it or why I was allowed to play with it. I’m not really sure why they were even in the house, as I don’t think anyone in my family has ever cooked, eaten, or done anything other than look with disdain on beans. One night, as I was wrapping the beans up for the evening and getting ready for bed, my mother told me to put the beans on the dresser in her bedroom for the night and I could get them in the morning. The next morning, still in my pj’s and eager to get going with the beans already, I went into her bedroom to discover that my beans had “magically” turned into jellybeans. You cannot imagine my disappointment. Sure, I smiled and went along with it, but I wanted my damn black beans back! You can’t play with jellybeans! They get sticky and fuzzy! The only thing you could do with them was eat them and then they were gone and then what?

My mother’s whimsy was lost on me for years. I’d decided early on that the tooth fairy was evil when I found a tooth that the dog had lost (at least, I hope it was the dog) in the back yard and decided to put it under my pillow and hope for the best. I got a nasty letter from the tooth fairy telling me that “I couldn’t fool her” or some such nonsense. I think there was also a postscript about how, if that pointy tooth really WAS mine, she wouldn’t pay based on issues of poor oral hygiene. That put an end to my dreams of growing up to be a tooth fairy, though I still left my teeth for financial reasons (our tooth fairy was very generous, my sisters and I received something like ten dollars a tooth).

Though I DO remember (well, I don’t really remember, but I’ve heard the stories) that, once upon a time in my very, very early days, I used to get visits from the “Clean Room Fairy.” The clean room fairy would leave me chocolate peanut butter candies when I was very young (less than three years old, I believe), while my sisters were passed over again and again for having such a messy room. I’m sure this was my mother’s attempt to inspire them to clean their room but all it ended up doing was causing years of childhood resentment on their part for me, the annoying younger sister who would mess up their bedroom and get rewarded with candy that I apparently wasn’t allowed to share with them.

Heh.

This Easter I will visit the family for a bit and more than likely spend the rest of the day with my Easter Beagles. I work tonight and tomorrow night, and will try like hell to get our early to go out afterwards…I’m getting sillier and sillier these days.