I had the best Easter I’ve had in a long while. Scratch that – I had the best holiday I’ve had in a good long while. Noah and I joined forces over 10 years ago, and we’ve done the double holiday ever since. This usually means heading down to San Antonio to spend the first part of the day with the Brodeurs and coming back to Austin to spend the second part of the day with the Watsons. The time frame works nicely for everyone, and we’re able to see the whole fam. But it makes for extremely long days … I don’t know why chatting around mass quantities of food wears me out, but when we’re driving back to Austin, we usually have to talk ourselves into round two. This year, however, my dad kindly suggested we stay in Austin and do our own thing. So, we did.

Easter is not a monumental occasion in the Watseur home. I won’t speak for Noah, but I’m comfortable enough to come out and say that I’m not Christian ==> I’m not religious ==>I don’t believe in God ==> I’m Atheist. I feel like saying that is akin to coming out as gay to your friends and family. I’m not in any way trying to trivialize how difficult it must be to tell the people around you that you’re homosexual, especially when you may be unsure of their responses. I only mean that when a person states that he or she does not believe in God, people seem disappointed. And concerned. A select few might even choose not to enjoy your company anymore. There has never been a time in my life when I’ve believed in any sort of God or higher power. In the same way, I never believed in Santa Clause or the Easter Bunny. I can remember being in daycare at four years old, wondering if the kids around me actually believed in Santa, because surely they were faking it, right? There’s a part of my brain that has always refused to believe anything that does not play out as entirely logical. And God, in my opinion, is entirely illogical. I believe in science, evolution, physics, and coincidence. I have a very difficult time wrapping my brain around the fact that the majority of the world believes in something that sounds about as realistic as the most fanciful fairy tale. My aim here is absolutely not to offend any of my family or friends with this post. I’m only explaining the thought process in my own brain. It’s all about tolerance, right? I couldn’t care less what people’s religious beliefs are. If anything, they fascinate me. If a person has a faith that is wholly comforting and secure when he/she needs it most, that’s almost enviable to a person that doesn’t have that. It’s just not the way I look at things. If something terrible happens, if I’m depressed or full of anxiety – I don’t think that it’s all part of some “greater plan” or that it’s a test I need to get through. It’s just life; it’s just brain chemicals.

Before this goes way too far in a direction I hadn’t intended, let’s get back to the topic at hand. I’d been excused from Easter in San Antonio, remember?

On Saturday night, Liam was determined to confirm whether or not there was an Easter Bunny. Like we’ve done with all things (including Santa and God), we told him to weigh his options and decide what he thought for himself. Being the practical boy that he is, Liam insisted on setting up my iphone to film, underneath a piece of purple cabbage as bait. In an attempt to outsmart my boy genius, I used his stuffed rabbit Thumper to discretely slide the cabbage over the lens of the phone, complete with very realistic nibbling and chewing noises. I tore up little pieces of cabbage and carrot over the porch and left his Easter basket for the morning. I slept well, knowing I was an Easter Bunny Superstar Ninja.

Nope. I failed.  The first words out of Liam’s mouth Sunday morning were, “Ugh, I really wonder how he got into the house last night.”

“What makes you think the EB was inside?” I asked

“Because he used that same basket that’s been sitting on top of the refrigerator for a year.” D’oh!!

“Hmmm. That is weird. Well, everyone’s going green, you know. Maybe if kids had baskets already, he just decided to use those.”

“Yeah … maybe …”

That was the end of it until he later discovered Thumper on the porch. I couldn’t think of any reasonable explanation for this. Tick tock, tick tock …

For the record, Liam no longer believes in the Easter Bunny. You can submit my nomination at http://www.motheroftheyear.com.

All was not lost: I made homemade donuts for breakfast, and we all enjoyed powdered sugary goodness while watching “Family Guy.” We lazed about until finally deciding to head over to the Watsons. There, we ate delicious steaks, took Liam’s rocket out to the soccer fields to launch a few times, played croquet, and just plain had a really great evening. The weather was perfect, the grass was crazy green, and the babies were kicking! Happy Easter, peeps

Waiting for the launch.

Blast Off!

To sum it up: The Watseurs may not believe in God. But we do believe in rockets, dammit.