It was Easter Sunday and time for church. The children were urged into their Sunday best and bustled out to the family station wagon for the drive to town, but not before all pin curls and hair ribbons had been twisted awry in gusting west winds.
Said winds, having traded the chill of winter for the warmer breaths of spring, had converted the snowdrifts around the old, small-town church into muddy bogs. The faithful picked their way through the mire, grateful, on this celebratory morn, for proof that spring had arrived.
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Most of the women had eschewed their customary snowboots in favour of more stylish footwear. Most of the men favoured those toe rubbers that you don’t see much anymore. These collected in the church foyer, creating a minor minefield for the cane-wielding members of the congregation.
Bouquets of early spring tulips, liberated from the gardens of church matrons, stood near the pulpit. Their vibrant colours provided contrast to the black garb of the minister.
The regulars were in attendance. So were the members of the piously challenged “C and E” church – those who attended only at Christmas and Easter.
The morning sun shone through the stained glass windows. Seen through that lens, even the church outhouse seemed bathed in radiant, rosy light.
Some years later, the collection plate would finally yield enough for indoor plumbing. But on this day in the murky past, one small member of the Sunday School class felt need to use the rustic facilities. A roll of pink toilet tissue – another thing you don’t see much anymore – was put into her temporary care, along with cautions to return the remainder for the benefit of others.
But on the return journey, the gusting wind snatched the roll from the tot’s hands. It bounced across the church lawn, unspooling as it went. It wrapped around the caragana hedge, the power pole, the mirror of the minister’s pick-up truck.
The wee girl was frantic. She’d been given responsibility for return of the roll and now what? Thither and yon she ran, collecting lengths of tissue, finally capturing the last rosy wisps stuck around the cardboard cylinder.
The wind at her back, and seemingly at her front and sides as well, she burst into the sanctuary, streaming reams of toilet tissue behind. In tears, she wrapped her arms around the first set of familiar legs that presented themselves to her blurred vision.
“Well, pink certainly is a nice Easter colour, dear,” said the kindly Mary Elton of Cowley United Church. “How sweet of you to decorate.”
We wish you a joyful Easter.
