Catherine Connors is a mother, writer and recovering academic who traded the lecture hall for the playroom and discovered that university students and preschoolers have much the same attention span. She still dips her toes into academic waters by writing the occasional scholarly article about the place of motherhood in Western philosophy, but mostly now she changes diapers and wipes noses and indulges in long reflections on whether Yo Gabba Gabba is a harbinger of the decline of western civilization. Oh, and she blogs: in addition to Bad Mother blogging at BeliefNet, she is, among other things, the author of HerBadMother.com, Managing Editor of MamaPop, moderator of Her Bad Mother’s Basement, co-founder and co-editor of WeCovet, Contributing Editor at BlogHer, and (deep breath) founder of and contributor to Canada Moms Blog. And in her spare time… oh, wait. She doesn’t have spare time. But she’s okay with that.
The Easter Bunny, Emilia informs me, is a fighter.
“He can fight, Mommy. Because he’s big.”
“Santa’s big, too.”
“Santa doesn’t fight, though, because he doesn’t need to.”
“Oh?”
“He just has elves around him, and they’re happy and nice, and Santa doesn’t need to fight them.”
I’m almost afraid to ask who or what it is, exactly, that the Easter Bunny needs to fight. Easter zombies? Were-chickens?
Emilia has her answer ready before I can even formulate the question.
“I saw on the nature show (the National Geographic channel, I’m guessing; which, remind me to cancel) that owls eat bunnies, and the Easter Bunny fights the owls. GIANT OWLS…”
(Really. Remind me to cancel that channel.)
“… so that he can make Easter safe for all the other bunnies, and also the children.”
“Owls don’t eat children, sweetie.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do.”
“Did you know why the Easter Bunny is a fighter?”
“No.”
“BECAUSE YOU DON’T KNOW EVERYTHING. So there COULD be owls that eat kids, so THERE.”
I want some clergyperson, somewhere, to do a sermon on the Easter Bunny as an evil owl-slaying ninja, and this as a metaphor for the life and death of Christ and his war against sin. Any takers?
posted March 30, 2010 at 3:03 pm
hmmmm – I have been kind of struggling for a kids talk on Easter. I like the Owl-slaying ninja aspect of all this.
Of course, a trip to a nature center might clear this up for your daughter. For many years we had a rather well done collage my daughter did when she was 6 or 7 – using the (well cleaned) skulls and bones that had been digested by an owl and then pooped onto the ground below. No sign of ninja weapons, though.
But I like your daughter’s thinking. Just cuz we don’t see it don’t make it so. Of course, owls are the symbol for wisdom. I hope she does not see this as a Faith v. Wisdom battle – that could be a problem, too.
So will she get an owl in her Easter basket?
posted March 31, 2010 at 11:16 am
OR… maybe you’re right! The giant owls DON’T eat children, but they do like chocolate eggs … and the easter bunny is trying to stop the owls from eating the childrens’ chocolate!
not that I’m getting into the easter bunny vs owl debate at all… nope, not at all.