Easter in Iowa

We leave on Saturday morning for my mother's annual Easter celebration.  We would leave earlier, but that would mean witnessing the chaos that is my mother preparing for the Easter celebration.

She begins months in advance, cleaning sections of the house, baking complicated things "from scratch," cooking scary-sounding things like "hamballs."  All of this must be done in preparation for the twenty-plus family members, family members' girlfriends and boyfriends (the young people are all married - it's the grandparents that are dating) and other hangers-on and stragglers that she invariably invites and next to whom I have to sit.

I feel for her.  Really, I do.  The time I hosted Thanksgiving for about half of my beloved's huge family plus my parents, I thought I was going to die from the stress.  Of course, then I was newly married and the stove broke.

However, I also think she's a victim of her own perfectionism.  Hell, at the little angel's first birthday party, I hosted more people than at my own wedding.  But I didn't try as hard as my mother does.

My mother's Easters are something to behold.  There are special treats for the kids.  An Easter-egg hunt.  Homemade goodies galore.  Special plates.  Special decorations.  A sparkling house.  Tablecloths. 

In other words, stuff that I would never do.

I feel for her, I do.  She throws a hell of a party.  And for the last two years, she's thrown in a birthday party for the little angel on top of all this.  But it does make her cackling, stress-induced, don't-you-dare-show-up-on-Friday-night batshit.  Because that is what trying to be the perfect mother will do to you. Beware, Grasshopper.

Sorry, Ma.  I had to do it.