I Always Hated Going to Church

As I said last year this time, I don't believe in Jesus or the Easter Bunny so I really dislike the Easter holiday.

This year is going to be better because we have renamed the holiday Celebration of Spring. I can get into that...new buds, singing birds, warm breezes..and I do like candy, especially Cadbury Cream Eggs.

I went to shop for asparagus and all I could find was asparagus on steroids. The stalks were as thick as an anorexic's arm. I know that larger asparagus can be very tender, but this was beyond large...these looked like fence posts.

(Another family member has been alerted to the asparagus problem in my grocery store and will look in her store...)

I also needed cherry tomatoes. My store was selling six for $3.99. Husband is the shopper in our family so I'm out of touch with 2006 vegetable prices but this seems ludicrous. I could eat six cherry tomatoes while I'm making the tossed salad!

Tomato problem will be passed on to husband when he goes out in the morning for the weekend supplies. I couldn't bring myself to buy them and maybe another grocery store is more merciful when it comes to pricing itty bitty tomatoes.

I do love watching the children hunt for eggs and I do look forward to a party with close friends and family.

I feel nostalgic for a time when -- even though I hated going to church (ever since I can remember going to church, I hated it) -- I did love the new Easter dress, shoes and hat my mother would buy me.

But then I remember "communion" and all the gagging I did with the mucous-tasting host in my mouth...gag, gag, gag all the way back to my pew where my parents would glare with steel eyes and downturned mouths; Privately praying that I wouldn't vomit up the host in front of the whole church.

Some things you are born with.

I was born hating church...the sounds and smells, the men in dresses...the incense. Only one thing was wonderful within the church walls and that was the music.

I loved the gorgeous music that was sung and played throughout mass...it was church's only saving grace...

In my preteen years I learned how to faint in church.

Being there gave me such creeps, (the body and blood of Jesus Christ) I mean that is disgusting. Who wants to be a canibal? Not me.

I would feel the black coming in from the side of my vision, get light headed, and all it would take was one more "body and blood" mention and I'd be out.

So by fainting before communion, atleast I alleviated the gagging walk from altar to pew.

I am listening to Bryn Terfel sing some incredibly beautiful music...Ave Maria, Panis Angelicus - but I don't associate this music with either god or church or mucous-tasting hosts.

If I did I'd be gagging or fainting.

So to all of you -- the ones like me who don't celebrate Easter as a religious holiday; the ones who do; and the ones who celebrate other holidays like Passover....

Hope you enjoy the day however you choose to spend it.

And if there are any rumors about giant asparagus taking over the earth...please email me and let me know.