Years have changed Easter celebration

Sometimes I am amazed at how much my life has changed through the years. I remember Easter as being special. The week before the holiday we always attended Palm Sunday services. I loved the palm fronds decorating the church and the story of Jesus riding the donkey into Jerusalem. On Easter, itself, our church offered communion to anyone and everyone. No one was excluded. The tiny cups of wine were replaced with grape juice to ensure that nobody over did it. Even then, I realized that one would have to drain every thimbleful in the sanctuary to get anything close to a buzz.
After church there was always Sunday dinner, dinner being what we now call lunch. Some years there were Easter baskets filled with chocolate bunnies, sugary Peeps and jelly beans. Sometimes there was an egg hunt in the backyard. The girl down the street and I would rehide the eggs and find them all over again.
The uncles and their families usually visited. The cousins and I roamed the fields, always ending up at the creek or in the barn.
Then people began dying. First it was my grandfather. The family started unraveling. One uncle refused to visit any more. One uncle died. We no longer saw that cousin after the funeral.
My mom married the guy who lived on the corner and soon my little brothers joined the family. I got married and had a daughter. It was my turn to come home on the holidays. My brothers and my daughter were now the ones who roamed the fields and explored the barn.
Years passed. My grandmother joined the ranks of the dead. My stepfather passed away. My last remaining uncle died. One cousin is in Louisiana training police dogs and hasn’t been seen in decades. Two more are seen only at funerals or the rare family gathering. Another lives on the periphery of the family.
The farm has been sold. There are no more fields to roam. No more barns to explore. No more creek to ford.
The phone rings and it is my mother. She is old and scared. I am trying to keep her independent as long as possible. Every phone call reminds me of the ultimate futility of this. She is sick to her stomach, what should she do?
I never know how serious it is. Should I make the trip to check on her, knowing it will be almost two hours before I can get there? It will take a few minutes to get ready, an hour and a half drive, and because I am in a hurry, there will be farm equipment or detours or something that will delay me.
I call my brother, Michael, and for once, he answers. He agrees to check on her. I also call the visiting nurse to see if she can work Mom into her schedule. She tells me to take her to the emergency room. A feeling of panic overwhelms me. I decide to wait until my brother calls me back.
A long fifteen minutes later, the phone rings. Michael says Mom is OK, just scared. He calms her down. The visiting nurse stops by. She checks her over and fixes her some breakfast. Michael makes a grocery run and returns before the nurse leaves. Everything settles down and he leaves for work.
I call later that day and she is feeling better. She begins her litany of ills and I feel powerless to fix what the doctors cannot.
I am writing this on Easter. I have not attended an Easter service in years. The sun is shining brightly. The spring flowers are starting their show. We are going to Mom’s later today to see for ourselves that once again, she has panicked for nothing.
I long for the days where health was taken for granted. I long for afternoons spent wandering the fields. Change is part of life. I know I remember the good parts and gloss over the bad, but sometimes I miss the way things used to be.