Ovum

Easter is surely the most confusing holiday when it comes to celebration.

You’ve got good old Peter Cottontail, hoppin’ down the bunny trail, carrying a basket of eggs, which is a very strange bit of cargo for a mammal, especially a male one.

And then, usually, in the eggs are chocolate pellets, something that—to anyone who has ever had a bunny and was responsible for cleaning the hutch—is not very appetizing in connection with a rabbit.  Or else, there are jellybeans which don’t make any sense, since why would Cottontail be planting sugary legumes; aren’t carrots his species’ favorite delicacy?  Or Peeps, which are even weirder, being a marshmallow simulacrum of the mid-20th century practice of selling pink and powder-blue dyed baby chickens for the ephemeral entertainment of suburban toddlers and, more often than not, the family dog.

Of course, all this pales in comparison to the peculiarity of the “official” story, the one where the supposedly immaculately-conceived alleged son of God is brutally sacrificed by crucifixion, buried, and then, three days later, comes back from the dead to absolve the faithful of their sins and let the rest of us know that his Dad will judge the world severely in His righteousness.

But you know what?  It all becomes clear when your ride your bike with fifty or so other cyclists to a city park by a lake at twilight and are met there by folks bedecked in bunny ears and cottontails who have kindly hidden plastic eggs filled with treats, adult and otherwise, on the rolling lawn leading to the water. 

And as you compare the shouts and murmurs of the happy human revelers to the guttural song of thousands of randy amphibians in the nearby brush, you come to understand how it all fits together: the rabbits, the eggs, the jellybeans, immaculate conception, the great mystery of creation and resurrection, and even, O Miracle of Miracles, the Peeps, so help me God.

Emerald

Pretty much everyone I pinched for violating the “wearing of the green,” requirement revealed that they were actually sporting verdant hues somewhere, even if only on their socks, underwear, or at the very least, in glitter on their eyebrows and foreheads, courtesy of one or more happy leprechauns sprinkling it around.

Which just goes to show that appearances can be deceiving and leave the best parts unseen at first, an apt metaphor, I think, for many a Thursday night ride, especially the first of the year to feature a meetup before dark—which may have been part of the reason, in addition to the Hibernian holiday—for such a good turnout on an evening that still, technically, qualified as being in winter.

St. Patrick’s Day, like New Year’s Eve and Cinquo de Mayo, is, to most seasoned tipplers, a kind of amateur night, so it was nice to see so many professionals in the art of boozing out on two wheels. 

The music bike blasted an appropriately-themed repertoire of jigs and reels and I realized, after a time, that Irish music eventually sounds surprisingly like Country, which I suppose make sense, given how many of those who fled the Potato Famine back in the 1800s ended up in the American Heartland planting tubers, drinking whiskey, and doing a two-step to fiddle and pipe around the fire.

Folks celebrating the holiday at various watering holes around town applauded as we rolled loudly past; I can’t say for sure whether any pink hearts, orange stars, yellow moons, or green clovers trailed in our wake, but I am confident that wherever we went was magically delicious, especially for those of us engaged in not only the wearing of, but in the smoking of the green, as well.

In How the Irish Saved Civilization, historian Thomas Cahill argues that Ireland played a critical role in preserving Western civilization; cool; I like how it helps with our inevitable decline, as well.