A h, Easter Sunday. Or as I like to call it, the last day before the influx of egg salad sandwiches.

Nah, I kid. To be honest, I rather like Easter.

The current reason for the celebration is associated with the end of Christian Lent, but the older history of it – having a holiday to say spring is here and we have survived the winter, let us celebrate not being dead – especially appeals to me.

Usually the equinox-driven first day of spring is the more obvious example, but in light of how this year’s spring equinox was immediately followed by half a foot of snow, Easter seems a more appropriate commemoration. Besides being a lovely reason to celebrate, Easter is also a fascinating example of how Christianity adapts and molds older traditions.

The egg thing, for example. While at this point, Easter eggs are associated with Jesus emerging from his tomb of three days, their origins are thought to trace back to the pagan goddess Ostara. The goddess, whose name derives from a proto- Germanic word for “dawn,” is the namesake for both the word “east” and the word “Easter” by way of several derivatives.

Much of the mythology sur- rounding the goddess is thin and thinly supported, but in modern paganism, Ostara one of eight solar sabbaths and the goddess recognized as a symbol of the spring equinox and spring itself. As such, there are strong associations with fertility symbols like flowers, seeds, eggs and rabbits. I’m not exactly sure how that progressed into “let’s hide eggs in the great outdoors and make children seek them out,” but I have fairly fond memories of that, so I’m not going to complain overmuch. There’s something genuinely lovely in being outside after being cooped up for so long, at last getting to be out in the sunshine.

Except when Easter brings rain with it because the rainy months never seem to get the message about special days. Then the day is mostly an exercise in staring out the window and sighing in disappointment, as I recall.

Still, whether as an ancient celebration of the return of daylight and sunshine or as an important religious celebration or just as an excuse to put pretty colors on eggshells and then try to find them hiding in the yard, Easter’s just a pretty nice day in general, and it was good to see it again.

I can still be unenthused about the inevitable egg salad, though.

— Nina Collay is a junior at Thornton Academy who can frequently be found listening to music, reading, wrestling with a heavy cello case, or poking at the keyboard of an uncooperative laptop.