The Pagan Roots of Easter
Easter is another one of those holidays with a colorful history, a lot like Halloween. On Easter Sunday the churches in America will all fill up. New clothes will be worn for the very first time. Christ is said to have arisen from the dead. A parade on Fifth Avenue has been announced. A long tradition of women wearing great big hats persists. Pastel shades of pink and yellow and blue will dominate the day. Little boys and little girls will hunt for gaily painted eggs and run about on perfect lawns. The menu promises a ham!
Scratch below the surface, though, turn back the book of time, and you’ll discover that Easter is a very different beast than we pretend it is today. Long before the name of Jesus Christ had e’er been uttered by a living soul, a lively bunch of European bon vivants (The Pagans, if for want of a more specific name) invented Easter. They called it Oestre, and for them the holiday was all about The Spring. To celebrate they danced, they took their clothes off, and they fucked like bunnies in enormous, flaming orgies in the middle of the night. It is funny that the bunny is an Easter symbol, still.
You may eat cake
It seems fitting that the first new wallpaper of the year should be an image from the past. It was my birthday three years ago, a humble affair, a small group of friends and good cheer. One notable extravagance was the cake. It was expensive and exquisite, conceived and executed by a person with a special appreciation for chocolate. An artist, to be sure. It must’ve had at least 8 layers ranging in density from mousse to fudge. The chocolate flowers that covered the top were so delicate, the mere warmth of your breath would melt them. It was a masterpiece more ephemeral even than an ice sculpture or a castle made of sand. It inspired in all of us a reverential urgency to consume it as quickly and as completely as we could. We did. But I escaped its delirious influence momentarily as I was eating my slice. I realized with a deep pang of loss that I had not taken a picture of the cake as it looked when it first came out of its box. That opportunity was gone forever. But I set down my plate on the table and captured the image above, just as it is. The room was dimly lit, but I refrained from firing the flash. Instead, I drew from my pocket a nifty little halogen wand that a friend had just given me. I’d been fucking around with it all night, taking unusual pictures by its unusual light.
