Soooo...was the Easter Bunny kind to you all? Lots of chocolate eggs, everyone? It's OK, you can tell me...s'not like I'll hit you in the face with a frying pan for every egg...or...anything...
Of course, it's only at ten o'clock on Easter Sunday that I realise I've been so enormously self-centred (mmm...gooey centred, like a melting chocolate truffle, or a warm double-toffee cake, just ooooozing with sugary goodness...)...
Ahem...where was I?
Oh yeah, only now do I realise I've been so enormously self-centred as to not get my beautiful wife a damn thing for Easter. No bunnies, no eggs, no expensive Belgian sin-fests, nothing. In fact, I've spent the day largely sitting on my still-humungo-ass, doing - of all things - proper work that I didn't manage to get done on Thursday. She on the other hand has been out in the kitchen all day, and has presented me with two gorgeous meals, prepared by hand, prepared from scratch, and perhaps most importantly of all, presented without the additional gift of a clonk round the head and a scowl. No no, with smiles, and jokes and genuine love, she's done all this, while I've been so wrapped up in myself that I've pretty much pissed the day away. Could we be any more 1950s?
I guess I've never really been an Easter person. We all have different memories of the holiday of course, but mine were mainly death-related. Fitting, I guess, given the 'story' of this moveable feast. But every Good Friday (seriously, I know it's all about the conquest of Death and Sin and all that, but really? You couldn't find a better name for the day your hero bled and suffocated to death? Cos if I was him, I'd take that personally. Likewise all the crosses - I think Bill Hicks said it best, when he said 'You think, if Jesus comes back, he ever wants to see another cross?), my mother and I would go up to the cemetary and visit graves. First my grandfather, then he and my gran together...then both of them and one of my best childhood friends. I'm fairly sure we had a big Easter dinner, and of course, I used to get eggs and (in later years) book tokens and the like...
Y'know I'm not sure what kind of self-pity party I was trying to get into here, but clearly it's bullshit. I didn't grow into an unthinking ass at Easter cos I went grave-visiting or cos I didn't get enough Easter eggs as a child...cos clearly I got plenty, and the cemetary visits were actually quite nice. No, clearly, I grew into an unthinking ass at Easter because when all's said and done, it's my default position. Yep, my name's Tony, and I'm a selfish prick. Hey, at least you don't have to live with me, right?
Of course, the slightly sick thing is that even as I'm writing this, d's gone back out to the kitchen...to bake. Annnnd even sicker than that, what she really wants to bake is hot cross buns, but she's not doing that because I can't eat them. So she's out there now, making cheese scones (which, granted, I also shouldn't eat at this time of night, but y'know, there comes a point when ya just have to say bite me and move on), that we can share.
And you wanna know the really stupid thing? While, for some reason, she trusts me to write whatever I need to write, sometimes d's worried that she comes off badly in these blogs.
Thing is, I'd be in the weeds without her. You can't be as toweringly egotistical as I am, and still function in any kind of healthy way, without someone to balance you out, to slap you sensible when you go mad, to hold you close when you get scared, and to hold you up when you get weak. And when my ego fails me, I am all of those things - I'm weak, and scared, and raging and stupid and mad and I want to give in and I want to give up and I want to just throw myself off a chocolate-coated cliff. And d will look up, and catch my eye, and notice, and not look away. And she'll reach out a hand for mine, and squeeze it. And everything will be alright again. And I'll be home.
(Sigh).
You'd think I'd learn to treat her better, really, wouldn't you?
No comments:
Post a Comment