By Crystal Nix
Easter 2020 will certainly be one to be remembered. Normally my Easter meant dressing up in your Sunday best, remembering the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, family dinners, egg dying, Easter baskets and egg hunts.
This year, during the COVID-19 pandemic, I was forced to think outside the box if I was going to celebrate Easter with my children and grandchildren. I donned mask, gloves and Clorox wipes and headed shopping for Easter goodies! I put my car keys and credit cards in my pocket – no purse. First on my list – sterilizing the grocery cart! Then filing it with candies, toys and bunnies.
Checking out was certainly different – social distancing at six feet apart. Then comes the difficult part, sanitizing every item before it goes into my car! That took a better part of 20 minutes! I have a cargo carrier in my car that I placed all of my sanitized goodies in. Problem is, I now have a buggy full of plastic grocery bags I need to dispose of.
Still donning my gloves, I grab a Clorox wipe, a buggy full of bags, and return my cart. I feel like a surgeon, disposing of my gloves and bags. I keep only my new Clorox wipe, which I use wiping my credit card and car door handle with, grab my hand sanitizer, and I’m finally ready to go home.
Just to be safe, I left all of my goodies in the car for a couple of days. By Saturday, I’m ready to make Easter baskets and deliver them to the kiddos! First stop is to my granddaughter’s! Nora’s waiting at their back window for me. At 1 1/2 years old, she didn’t quite understand social distancing. She heads to the door to open it and let Mamaw in! I watch from a distance as she dives into her basket! Blowing kisses to the kids, I’ve delivered the last of the baskets.
Easter dinner was quiet, sharing potato soup, deviled eggs, carrots and fresh bread with Jeffra and Doug DeViney. I am trying really hard to limit my exposure to people, but I miss my family. We’ve been able to keep working at the newspaper.
We have become a world of drive-bys and ups – there are parades to honor health care workers, birthday parties, our high school seniors, funerals… the list goes on and on. Our pharmacists are walking out prescriptions to customers in their cars. You can call in an order to many grocery stores, drive up and have them loaded into your car.
But amidst all this social distancing, families are playing games together, eating meals together, kids are playing outside and walking and riding bikes as families. Our fast paced lives have slowed down. Slowly but surely, this pandemic is changing our daily routines and life as we’ve come to know it.
