PETER BUFFA -- Comments & Curiosities

“In your Easter bonnet, with all the frills upon it . . .” OK, what’s

the next line? Tick-tick-tick-tick. Buzzzz.

“You’ll be the grandest lady in the Easter parade.” Irving Berlin,

1933, by the way.

As holidays go, I like Easter. There’s none of the stress of other

holidays like, yikes, Christmas. No gifts, no decorations, no whirlwind

of parties and events, etc. It’s a nice, quiet time of rebirth, religious

and otherwise.

Glorious weather, spring flowers, trees bursting with life -- a season

that anyone can love. That’s not to say that Easter doesn’t offer its own

catalogue of customs and quirks. And that, of course, is where I come in.

If the inane, the arcane and the downright bizarre are what you crave,

you have come to the right place, you little chocolate bunny you.

First of all, why do they call it “Easter?” Like many holidays, Easter

is a mixture of religious beliefs and pagan traditions. The name itself

is from an Old English word “Eostre,” which means “we can’t spell.”

Not really. “Eostre” was the Anglo-Saxon goddess of spring, and her

festival was a celebration of the season of rebirth, which makes it a

logical ancestor for the Christian holiday of Easter.

Ever wonder how they decide when Easter will fall from year to year?

By the time I get through, you’ll be sorry you did.

Easter can fall on any Sunday between March 22 and April 25. It all

depends on that year’s “paschal moon.” The paschal moon, as if you didn’t

know, is the lunar cycle that produces a full moon on the vernal equinox

-- March 21 -- or the first full moon thereafter.

Dizzy yet? Hang on. We’re almost done. Easter is the next Sunday after

the 14th day (full phase) of the paschal moon. Well, OK then! That clears

things up.

There are very scary looking astronomical and liturgical tables that

can tell you when Easter falls in any given year, from when Moses was a

small boy to any year in the future. For instance, in 2021, Easter Sunday will fall on April 4.

Can you get this kind of information anywhere else? No you cannot.

Don’t thank me. It’s my job.

What is the preferred dish for Easter dinner? If you didn’t say “ham,”

go to your room. It is one more tradition that the early New England

settlers borrowed from their Native American neighbors.

A springtime planting festival was an annual Indian tradition. They

would party hearty for days, feasting on a selection of smoked meats that

had been salted and stored through the winter. The settlers took a bite,

went bonkers and tried their own version with the most plentiful meat

they had -- pork. And thus was born the ham dinner on Easter Sunday.

So what’s the deal with all these chicks and lambs and bunnies?

Simple. They’re all symbols of new life. What about coloring eggs for

Easter? Eggs have been a symbol of the cycle of life since ancient times.

The Romans, Persians and Chinese all painted and decorated eggs during

their spring festivals. There’s also a wonderful Polish legend about

coloring Easter eggs. Supposedly, Mary offered eggs to the Roman soldiers

at the foot of the cross, appealing to them for mercy. As her tears fell

on the eggs, they were transformed in brilliant colors.

In England, the household records of Edward I in the year 1290 show an

entry of 18 pence for 450 eggs to be gold-leafed and colored as Easter

gifts. That’s 37 dozen eggs for 18 pence! Those were the days when a

pence was a pence, dad gummit.

In Bulgaria, bright red is the egg color of choice. On Easter Sunday,

everyone picks an egg and taps it against somebody else’s egg until one

of the eggs meets its demise. The person with the last egg standing will

have a year of good luck. I guess you have to be there.

In a recent survey of Americans’ favorite Easter egg colors, 35% said

blue. 18% chose purple, 17% pink and 7% green. Yellow and red tied at 6%

each. Also, 64% said they eat their Easter eggs and 22% said they throw

them out -- 2% said they just let them rot. Isn’t that special. Thanks

for sharing.

I don’t care if you are the Easter Bunny, get your hot cross buns off

my table! Hot cross buns are a long-standing Easter tradition. Most

people assume the little glazed cross is a symbol of Easter. Not really.

A number of ancient pagan cultures baked breads and sweet cakes

imprinted with a cross and used them as offerings to the gods. Serving

hot cross buns on Good Friday is an English Easter tradition.

Nineteenth century bakers started making the crosses out of icing

instead of imprinting them, which was an enormous pain in the bunny. Do

you know why bakers work such long hours? They knead a lot of dough. I

can’t believe I said that.

The Easter basket has Catholic origins. In Europe, Catholics would

bring a basket with the breads and meats to be used for their Easter

dinner to Mass to have it blessed. In the last century, the basket

evolved into a candy and chocolate affair for the kids. The baskets would

be waiting for them when they got back home, left behind by you know who

with the big ears and the thunder thighs.

What about hiding eggs? No one is sure exactly where that started, but

a German storybook in 1682 includes a tale of a rabbit that produced

colorful eggs and hid them in a garden.

And that brings us back to that Easter bonnet with all the frills upon

it. Large bonnets and bright clothes are another long-standing symbol of

the end of winter and the arrival of spring. At the turn of the twentieth

century, families would gather for a stroll down “the boulevard” to show

off their Sunday best.

Some cities are trying to revive the custom. In New York, Fifth Avenue

is closed to all traffic on Easter Sunday and the street teems with

families, baby strollers and dogs -- with plenty of bonnets on the babies

and bunny ears on the dogs of course. So there you have it.

Enjoy the day, savor the season, and if someone puts raisin sauce on

your ham, eat it anyway. It’s Easter. I gotta go.

* PETER BUFFA is a former Costa Mesa mayor. His column runs Sundays.

He may be reached via e-mail at [email protected].