They’re back.

They’re more addictive than chocolate-covered strawberries and fresh, hot buttered popcorn at the movie theater.

Once again, I’m writing about Cadbury Mini Eggs.

Those delicious, calorie-heavy delicious solid milk chocolate eggs covered in a thin coating of a hard candy shell that are absolutely irresistible.

In my humble, chocoholic’s opinion, Cadbury Eggs are the only Easter chocolates worth the calories.

Yes, there’s other Easter candies out there that have been around longer and are more closely associated with Easter.

Specifically, the marshmallow Peeps. According to their website, over 700 million yellow, pink and blue sugar-covered marshmallow Peeps are sold every year.

All traditional Easter baskets have a few yellow Peeps peeking out over the plastic green grass, but that’s too much straight sugar for me.

Likewise with jelly beans, yet their popularity grows every year. As a result, everybody’s trying to get into the jelly bean business – there’s Starburst, Brach’s, Mike & Ike, Starburst and Jolly Ranchers jelly beans.

The Jelly Belly Company took the guess work out of jelly bean sleuthing. They print a picture of the jelly bean and its flavor on the back of the bigger bags for those who hate surprises. Nothing’s worse than biting into a red Jelly Belly, thinking it’s cherry, and your mouth burns because it’s cinnamon.

No Easter basket is complete without the requisite chocolate bunny. The basic think-walled chocolate bunnies — the ones with the candy eyes and carrot necktie – still rule the middle shelf of the candy aisle.

As they should.

A look up and down the Easter candy aisle this week revealed dozens of spin offs from the Easter basket basics. There’s a cellophane package that looks like a carrot filled with Reese’s Pieces.

Sorry, Reese’s Pieces, but you’ll always be the Easter wanna-be when it comes to the granddaddy of Easter candy, the basic M&M.

Easy to eat and delicious, even though every single one tastes exactly the same, no Easter basket is finished unless the Easter Bunny throws a handful of plain M&Ms into the basket.

Nothing comes close to the basic M&M for the most chocolate in a small package. Not a mini Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup. Not the gold-covered chocolates that look like coins but taste like wax. Imposters all, so I’m glad my Easter Bunny insists on the real thing – M&Ms.

For those who want something a little bigger than an M&M, there’s Lindt fancy chocolates. At $7 a bag, that’s a treat the Easter Bunny leaves for mom and dad.

And why shouldn’t the parents get a gift from the Easter Bunny? We subsidize that rabbit, so we should get a cut of the action at the front end.

But back to the gold standard of Easter basket treats, the Cadbury Mini Egg. Some of the chocolatiers tried to cash in on Cadbury’s action a few years ago with solid milk chocolate eggs.

Sorry, Hershey’s and Nestlé’s, but your brand of chocolate is best enjoyed in a long, thin bar, not a chunk of chocolate wrapped up in foil that’s almost impossible to remove.

So if anybody’s interested in starting a “Cadbury Eggs Anonymous” group, give me a shout. I could be off the hook, though, because Cadbury Eggs are only available in the United States around Easter. After that, one has to order them online and pay a hefty shipping fee.

Even this Cadbury Egg addict won’t pay for extra shipping, and I don’t think I can convince the Easter Bunny to make a return appearance in May.

This Easter, may your blessings, chocolates and jelly beans be plentiful. And may the Easter Bunny bless you with not one but two bags of Cadbury Mini Eggs.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

Some people are worriers. I’m one of those.

Some people are procrastinators. Guilty as charged.

Some people are panickers. I’m not only one of those, but I lead the pack.

I’d like to be the person who remains calm in a crisis, talks others off the ledge and can quietly guide the masses to peaceful pastures. Instead, I think the worst is going to happen, freak out and gallop full speed ahead in panic mode.

I wasn’t always like this. When I was a teenager, I looked at disasters as adventures. After I got my driver’s license, my dad let me have his old Pontiac Executive, but the tank had its quirks.

The brakes didn’t always catch, but if I pumped them hard enough, I’d eventually come to a stop. Still, I didn’t panic when that happened, which was most of the time.

I can’t blame panicking on genetics. My mom is one of the calmest people I’ve ever observed in an emergency.

One afternoon, my great aunt came to visit with her daughter. Aunt Adele was sitting at the table, and Mom noticed she’d become glassy eyed and then her aunt slowly started to slip out of the chair.

Her daughter started screaming, but my mom remained perfectly calm.

“Go get a glass of water and a cold washcloth,” she told me, all the while holding my aunt’s head up and telling her cousin to calm down.

Her aunt came around in a minute or two, but my mom never lost her cool. I was quite impressed with her calm presence, and I’ve never forgotten that incident.

I believe the panic stage started when I had my first child. I would go in and check on him almost every hour to make sure he was breathing. Occasionally, I’d have to nudge him a little to get him to move so I’d be sure he was okay.

With my second son, I relaxed a little – not a whole lot – but I’d still go in and nudge him a couple of times during the night to make sure he was okay. With the third son, I just let him sleep with us until he was about a year old so I wouldn’t have to get out of bed.

Forget peanut butter or hot dogs until they were in first grade. I’d read toddlers could choke on those two foods. So they were banned from the pantry.

I’ve read hundreds of articles on how to remain calm, but I can’t seem to follow their advice when things go haywire even though I intellectually know they’re right.

Step one – before reacting, assess what’s happening. My assessment is the ship is not only taking on water, but it’s sinking and sinking fast.

Step two – breathe. Experts say to breathe in deeply and calmly while taking stock of the situation. Oh, I’m breathing all right – fire and brimstone and sheer panic. My heart’s pounding, sweat is rolling down my back and all I can think is – why is somebody telling me to breathe instead of helping fix the “we’re-all-doomed” problem.

Step three – call for help. That one’s easy because my mom or my husband are two people I call for help. I’ve seen my mom in action, and my husband is the calmest, most capable person I’ve ever met in an emergency.

He’s the reassuring presence in my life, and after I ratchet down from screaming “Call 911 immediately” back to the “I-can-handle-this” level, I have to apologize for running around like the sky’s falling in.

Luckily, after almost 40 years, the man gets me.

And never reminds me to breathe.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.         

I’m not a huge outdoors person. But when the sky is an unlimited cobalt blue, the humidity is practically non-existent and the temperature hovers around 72 degrees, I’m spending time outside.

Luckily, that perfect triangle came together on the day we decided to take our four grandchildren to one of most spectacular areas in southeastern Texas – Brazos Bend State Park.

Not only is the park a short driving distance from any place in Fort Bend County, the price is right. For two adults and four eager children, the admission total was $14 – that’s less than it costs two of us to go to the movies.

A friendly volunteer welcomed us to the park, and I wondered how she could have a smile on her face as there were six cars in front of us, and I know we weren’t the first ones to the park during spring break. But smile and welcome us she did as she wished us a fun day.

Since it was noon, we headed back to Hale Lake for a quick picnic lunch so we’d have time at the visitor’s center and to walk some of the numerous trails in the almost 5,000-acre park.

While I spread peanut butter and jelly on some bread, the kids found trees to climb. Their squeals of delight was music to my ears, and they played tag and ran until they were out of breath.

After the trees had been conquered, we headed to the visitor’s center. The kids couldn’t wait for what they thought was going to be the highlight of the trip – the opportunity to pet a baby alligator.

But we saw a group of people in the amphitheater next to the center, so we headed over to see the show.

A park ranger was talking to the crowd as a snake lazily coiled around his arm, and the kids were mesmerized. When he said they could come down and pet the rat snake, the line of excited youngsters reached from the stage to the top of the theater.

In terms everyone could understand, the ranger talked about the importance of all creatures in the environment, cautioned children to not pick up snakes and then asked for questions. All four of ours shot their hands up in the air, and I knew the ranger had hit a home run.

Once inside the center, our grandchildren visited the patient volunteer holding a baby alligator at least 10 times, picked up every skull and shell on the nature table and watched the alligator jaws open and close for five full minutes.

Then it was time to head out on the trail. By this time, our neighbors had joined us, and six children took bets on how many alligators we’d see that day.

They took in everything on the trail, from the wildflowers to the coots paddling around on the lake as catfish lazily swam beneath them. No one complained about the distance, and they were thrilled when we told them we were headed to the observation tower where they could see for miles.

I stayed at the playground with the 3-year-old while the older ones headed out to the tower and had a chance to people watch. Children of all ages were using the strong limb of an oak tree as a swing, and there was constant laughter as they bounced up and down on the see-saw they’d created.

People were on the dock fishing, others were taking photos and others were lying back in the grass, soaking up the sun. I didn’t see anybody talking or texting on a cell phone, and that included me.

We were unplugged and unhurried, and that feeling lingered as we drove out of the park, all of us tired but filled with the satisfaction that comes from a day well spent at this crown jewel in the Texas Parks system.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

 

“He was so young,” my mom would say with a sigh as she read the obituaries in the daily newspaper. “He was only 65.”

I remember hearing her say those words when I was a teenager and thinking “Sixty-five? That’s ancient.”

The closer I get to that age, the more I think “Sixty-five? That’s so young!”

The obituary page and I have a long association, starting with those daily musings from my mom. I largely ignored the obituaries unless a friend’s parent passed away or someone I knew died unexpectedly.

It wasn’t until I came to work at this newspaper that I discovered the importance of a well-written obituary. One of my first job responsibilities was typing up the obituaries and occasionally helping a family member write an obituary for a loved one.

At first, I distanced myself from the obituary, telling myself they were people I didn’t know and the write-up required me to spell the names correctly and make sure I got all of the obits in that day’s newspaper.

It wasn’t until I had to help a tearful woman write her mother’s obituary that the words hit home to me – this write-up wasn’t just an article in the newspaper. This obituary summed up a person’s life, their achievements, their families, their dreams and the sum total of their lives.

Mostly, I was amazed at the accomplishments people earned over a lifetime.

Many were military veterans who honorably and proudly served their country and often met their future spouse while serving.

Some obituaries listed the careers and awards the deceased achieved during their lives. The reporter in me wished I’d have met that person when they were alive so I could’ve talked to them about their accomplishments, from drilling oil wells in the Middle East to those who worked at NASA during the early days of the space program.

The pictures included with obituaries always surprise me. At first, I didn’t understand why people would publish a picture of themselves in their 20s when they passed away late in life. I think it’s how they see themselves when they look in the mirror – not as an 80-year-old living on a fixed income but as a 20-something optimistic person with their whole life in front of them.

My heart always breaks when the obituary is for a young child or a teenager, and I find myself thinking of those families for weeks after reading or typing the obituary. The pain never leaves nor does it ever diminish. We simply learn how to handle the loss.

Then there are the obituaries that make me smile and wish I’d met that person. They’re the people who threw caution to the wind, wore what they wanted, said what they thought and never met a stranger.

None of the obituaries I’ve ever written or read stated that the deceased’s career was the light of their life. They were proud of their accomplishments, but that’s not what brought them joy and fulfillment.

The obituaries that make the most powerful impact on me describe a wonderful grandparent, the adoration their families had for them, the love they had for their pets – who are always named in the obituary – traveling to far-away places and volunteering in the community.

Reading the obituaries changed how I live my life. I understand we’re only here for a short time and, one day, what we did will be printed somewhere.

Make sure that’s what in that write up is you loved and laughed with all your heart and woke every day looking for the wonder that’s around every corner.

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.

There’s lots of words that describe me – mom, wife, sister, daughter. Then there’s the other words – bossy, loud, clumsy. But one word that would never be ascribed to me is the word “gentle.”

I thought about that description when I saw an online post regarding the time Fred Rogers, known to most of us as Mr. Rogers, appeared before the Senate in 1962 to request funds to help support a new concept, national public television.

This was the first time the senate had ever seen Rogers speak because he was relatively unknown at the time.

A young and earnest Rogers told a cynical Senate panel that children need to learn to trust. Rogers talked about reaching more children through television to help them learn the small things in life that make a child feel safe and loved.

Despite the gruff manner of the senator, Rogers kept his calm, quietly convincing the panel that quality programming was needed to develop the inner needs of young children. He ended his testimony with a reading of one of his songs about what to do with the mad that you feel.

“I can stop when I want to, can stop when I wish, I can stop, stop, stop any time and what a good feeling to feel like this,” he read in that never-hurried familiar voice.

His testimony convinced the Senate to fund public broadcasting. Fred Rogers was beloved by at least three generations of children, and I count myself as one of his fans.

He didn’t get that love by bopping characters on the head, using profanity or bathroom humor. He taught children simple lessons – routines can be soothing, neighbors are important in one’s life and the little things in life, the things children notice, are important.

And he did all of that through a gentle, calm manner that’s not in great demand these days. It’s a shame gentle movies like “The Indian in the Cupboard,” “The Black Stallion” and “Searching for Bobby Fischer” aren’t more popular.

The heroes in these movies are quiet children who come to understand that gentleness, not brute force, is the way to face life. They do the right thing in the movie while maintaining their self-respect.

Instead, we flock to loud movies filled with CGI effects that practically blow us out of our seats. If a movie doesn’t have at least five explosions, two or three characters that speak as if a sailor gave them elocution lessons and unsavory characters, then the film’s a flop.

As much as I enjoy action-packed movies and loud music, my soul often yearns for quiet– a stroll in the park where the only sounds are the leaves rustling high above my head, pebbles skittering across a well-worn path and songbirds calling to each other from the tree tops.

The only times I come close to a state of gentleness is when I’m rocking a sleeping child late at night when the house is quiet and still. Occasionally I’ll find myself walking along a wooded path in our neighborhood, and I can practically feel my muscles unwind.

I know people who are gentle from time to time, but I know very few who are gentle with everyone, from children to adults to animals.

In this hurry-up world filled with distrust, anger and a fear of the future, it’s difficult to maintain a gentle attitude, and I count myself guilty on all counts of throwing gentleness to the side.

I need to remember the words Mr. Rogers taught us – “Discovering the truth about ourselves is a lifetime’s work, but it’s worth the effort.”

Maybe there’s some gentleness in me after all – I think Mr. Rogers would quietly tell me to go find it.

 

This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.