Easter

At first, after he died, Errol was still in my muscle memory. My muscles flexed when we went out the front door and I reached for his stroller. Flexed when I got in the car and braced my legs to counterbalance his weight in my arms. The longer Errol is gone, the more my muscles lose their memory and relax. It’s only when we go to the doctor, or Errol’s school, or to the farmers market, or do something we often did with Errol that my muscles tighten and warm.

But Errol is still in my head, in the constant loop of memories that conjure him.

I receive a visitation on Easter Morning. My head is full of beautiful dreams, backed it seems, by a soundtrack of loud brass music filling the night air. Then I awake disoriented, and realize I’m not dreaming, that it is Easter morn (barely – it’s 3:30 – don’t these people ever sleep?!) and the sounds in my dream are coming from the Moravian brass band assembled on our street corner to play hymns about resurrection and everlasting life.

Bands of peripatetic Moravians roam the city streets in the middle of the night every Easter morn to herald the good news of Jesus’s ressurection. Or at least that’s what they say they’re doing. I had heard a late night Moravian band once before when I was recovering at home from an illness, so this concoction of music, suffering, and healing seems very natural to me. At least, at 3:30 in the morning, half asleep and half clothed, it feels reasonable that a brass band would be on our street corner, playing 18^th century tunes, to herald spring and rebirth. Of course, these insomniac Moravians blowing their wake up call into a sleeping neighborhood probably don’t have the first idea about Errol’s death. Most likely, they have picked our house at random and aren’t doing anything more than just playing notes. But that morning, walking out into the dark, standing on the front porch in my underwear, listening to the hymns float through the humid night air, my head is filled with Errol and in my mind, these Moravians know our story – our loss, and this is an annunciation – a direct call - to us, to bring good news of our dearly departed Errol.

I fall back into a deep sleep but I still don’t dream of Errol.