Author: Fay Mitchell
Birds are singing, tulips are blooming and spring breezes are pushing winter away. Easter will soon be here. Unlike Easters past, this year churches and cathedrals should not welcome the faithful through their locked doors. The coronavirus has much of America and the world shuttered. This Easter will be unlike any other.
When contemplating this most sacred of sabbaths, memory turned to Easters past, and I must confess some of my favorite memories involved…dresses. Growing up in rural eastern North Carolina when going to church was a given, so was the Easter outfit and my mom was a faithful practitioner of this ritual and a bit of a fashionista. I always enjoyed the spirited Baptist services, and I loved the Easter fashion show.
The first dress I remember was when I was six-years-old. It was white with a big, round lace-trimmed collar and plain bodice over a full skirt. Black patent leather shoes and turned down white lace-trimmed socks were a must. Top it off with a white hat with a small turned-up brim, and I was ready for the day.
By middle school and pubescence, I was ready for a dark beige knee-length sheath dress and my first lipstick - the color nearly nude. Even the name was grown-up. It had just a hint of pink and was altogether perfect on pecan tan me. Shoes and bag in the color bone (remember that??) and I was ready to go.
As a high school senior, I loved the romantic look, and a white bodiced dress over a chocolate brown dirndl skirt with large white flowers was just the ticket. The wide pink belt and long full sleeves was great effect for the just over the knees look.
Remembering a college dress was hard. I didn't go home then because spring break was usually in early March (to coincide with the ACC tournament I always felt). That meant no Easter shopping. I do remember a favorite dress with a full-sleeved white top and a dark blue skirt with small white flowers and a long blue floral print belt. It was very much the peasant look.
I noticed a lot of white and floral prints in my past, both of which I still appreciate all these years later. But I also like more tailored looks, and bold prints and geometric designs. One Easter suit had a short, chocolate brown skirt with a white fitted sleeveless top trimmed with three brown buttons on one shoulder. Another was a tailored pastel pink short-sleeved suit with gray buttons that reached below the knees. These were described as my Junior League looks.
Of course, I decked out my kids too. It was so much fun! My toddler son was too adorable in a yellow linen suit with short pants. A dark blue cutaway jacket over a blue and white striped shirt worn with a red bowtie and white shorts was the perfect little boy outfit, both with long white socks. The older he got the more difficult it was to attain that perfect look. A blue-gray square-patterned suit worn with a white broad striped shirt and blue paisley print tie when he was about age six, and a navy-blue jacket with a white shirt, gray pants and gray striped tie at age seven were about the end of dapper youthfulness for him. Oh, khakis are…just khakis.
When my daughter came along there were endless possibilities. Her toddler Easter dress had tiny pink flowers on a pale blue background, a broad pink ribbon belt and white, round, scalloped-edged collar. A year later was a pale pink print with blue flowers and an oversized triangle collar with ruffled trim and a pink fabric flower at the point, and lace-trimmed white socks of course. At about four was a snazzy pink knit skirt and top with a white lace collar and white tights. At eight was an avocado green dress with white double-breasted buttons and large white Puritan collar. There were many more years of adorable dresses for her, but to be balanced I'll stop here.
Given that Easter prompted all this, I must mention a few stand-out Easter services. I'll start with a spring break when my husband, kids and I went to visit my sister in New York. She fed us Southern style. We went to Easter service at a Methodist church in Harlem, where they performed Handel's Messiah beautifully. Not the Hallelujah chorus, but the entire oratorio!
Another was a spring break to New Orleans (before Hurricane Katrina) and Easter service at St. Louis Cathedral and communion in America's oldest continuous use Catholic cathedral with visitors from America and beyond. Finally, there was one at my home Presbyterian church in Durham, where as youth director I had the kids perform the events of the original Easter morning discovery at the sepulcher, and they pulled it off. Whew!
But this Easter is different. New York and New Orleans are besieged by the coronavirus pandemic. Now I am divorced, children grown, and working from home. For a very rare moment in my life, I won't be in church on Easter Sunday but will join church service online as we do these days. But I may be compelled to order a dress for that service too - to save our economy. It's my patriotic duty.