Rumi said that spring was Christ, "martyred plants rising up from their shrouds." Easter says that love is more powerful than death, bigger than the dark, bigger than cancer, bigger even than airport security lines.

I find myself sometimes, as I go about the most ordinary of days, thinking how happy I am and how I love a particular part of my day. It happens on Mondays and Wednesdays after dinner when I get up from the table to load the dishwasher and start pulling out things for the kids' lunches for their next day of school. It happens when I go in the kitchen first thing each morning and put my jar of coconut oil in a saucepan of water to let it melt. It certainly happens when I start making coffee. It happens when I sit down to read Pinocchio to Story and Cash on a homeschool day.

It was one of those clean out times when kids don't get asked whether their junky stuff stays or goes. A couple months ago, while Story slept one evening, Superman went in the bag with lots of other trinket toys. The donation bin sat in our garage for six weeks at least, until finally, the day after Thanksgiving, a haul was made to the Goodwill.