Easter Surprise

Notes from the Prairie: I Wonder column #24

As I remove my Easter hat at home, I sing again one of the morning’s hymns:

Because He lives, I can face tomorrow,
Because He lives, all fear is gone,

I wonder why it still flows in my mind. Then I remember. In 2014 during four months of home hospice care, my father played this hymn daily. When diagnosed with terminal cancer, he had told me through tears, “I’m not afraid of death, but I am afraid of the dying process.” He revived his courage with that hymn. We included it in his funeral.

As I place my hat among a dozen others on my closet shelf, a memory from July 2000 rises. My brother Marv drives north on the divided four-lane between Tucson and Phoenix. Beside him, Dad exclaims, “Shoot! I was going to buy a hat at that gas station, and I forgot.”

“No problem!” says Marv. He checks the rearview mirror, brakes hard and bumps through the median to head back south.

I grab the seat in front of me with both hands and blurt, “I’m part of a crazy family!”

Dad turns toward me and retorts, “Maybe, but we have lots of fun, don’t we?”

Back at the gas station, he buys the leather Stetson he wants. He can now protect his bald head from the Arizona sun.

Gregarious and loud, Dad lived in the moment. He leaped into conversations with strangers, often greeting them with a wisecrack. Mom listened, smiled and added a sentence or two. He was a social butterfly. She was a pupa in a chrysalis.

After Dad died and Mom moved to senior housing. I was mystified when she wisecracked with staff and residents and joked with unknown clerks and waitresses. Then I realized she was taking on Dad’s roles.

Last winter I wondered how wearing hats would feel. I discovered being unconventional delighted and freed me.

On my second groceries trip hatted, a Hy-Vee clerk recognized I sported a different one and said, “I like your new hat!”

I responded, “Thanks for noticing!”

While shopping, I tapped the shoulder of a stranger in a hat and exclaimed, “I’m so glad to see someone else in a hat!”

She grinned. “It keeps my head warm! I bought this in an antique store in Missouri.”

I chuckled, looked both ways and whispered, “Mine comes from a thrift store!” We laughed together.

Ten seconds ago we had been strangers; in that moment, we bonded.

Shaking my hand outside of church this Easter morning, the assigned greeter said, “Good morning! All you need is a corsage, and you’ll be stepping right out of the 1950s.”

I grimaced and retorted, “Maybe I belong back there!” Then I wondered if my quip was true.

After shelving my hat, I pause before exiting the closet and glance at my hat collection.

Topped with a different hat, I flit from the closet, a butterfly emerging from a chrysalis.

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Carol Van Klompenburg is a writer and speaker living in Pella Iowa. Her email is carolvk13@gmail.com. Her new website is now live at www.carolvanklompenburg.com.