Easter Musings

The human brain is as complex as it is interesting. I am truly no fan of science, but I am always marvelled by the mixture of organic matter - blood, fluids, brain matter, the dura, with the electrical synapsis that they say transmits feelings, thoughts and whatever to the brain. But then, I am not musing about the brain today, but about the core memories that comes with Easter, or Easther as some people spell it.

Sunday, 5th April, 2026, Easter Sunday. I woke up rather early for someone who slet late into the night, and I remember how days like these go in my father’s house, and I vividly remember one Easter weekend, my mum woke us all very early with the sound of the bell. Oh how I miss spending the days of my life with that woman. People who know my mum think she is that quiet woman, but man, you’ll be shocked at how truly dramatic she is ( I am actually smiling as I type this).

That Saturday, mum woke us up, and brought out her CAC hymn book (she is actually a pastor’s kid), and she started singing Easter songs. I remember her singing Jesu ye titi aye, (Jesus lives), and young me was wondering why I shouldn’t be scared of death, when in the real sense, I am still scared to pick something in a dark room. I remember how sometimes, she would reminisce her days, playing the drum (ilu agbamole) in church, and she would dramatise how she used to beat the drum, with vigor and fervour. After this flashback, I told myself that I’ll pen all of these down for her on her birthday (coincidentally in some days time); but then, I opened my YouTube Music and started playing Easter hymns, and even searched and specifically played CAC hymn. I miss her so much.

Then, off to church, and then choir hits us all with Easter hymns (In Christ alone and Old rugged cross). Tell me why my mind fixated on my dad, my man (hehehehe). Old rugged Cross. My dad used to love Country Music, and would rave about his Kenwood turntable, and how he used to play Jim Reeves records, and would whistle and hum along. I used to hate listening to Jim Reeves, and in the early days of Symbian and Android phones, he made us download the songs on his memory card. Now, I’m in church and I’m listening to my parents’ favourite songs and apart from being moved by the sacrifices of God, I am here missing home so much.

But back to Easter, I remember reading about Easter eggs, and it felt weird cos this season isn’t about eggs, just like Christmas isn’t about chicken and turkey. In fact, communities especially Western ones, have this interesting habit of wrapping the sacred in the familiar until you can barely tell them apart. Somewhere along the line, chocolate eggs and Easter bunnies got stitched onto the resurrection story, and nobody really questioned it.

We do it too, in our own way. The jolof rice and the new clothes and the family visit, all perfectly valid, all slightly beside the point. But I think that’s okay, actually. Humans have always needed something physical to hold while processing something spiritual. The eggs, the agbamole drum, the Jim Reeves record — they’re all just containers. The thing inside them is what matters.

And what’s inside Easter, when you strip it all back, is the audacious idea that death is not the final word. That the worst thing that can happen is not actually the worst thing. I sat in church this morning thinking about my parents, about how much I’ve stored from them without knowing I was storing it, and I realised that’s its own kind of resurrection. The things they planted in me when I was too young to appreciate them, the hymns, the dramatised drum performances, the country music I pretended to hate, none of that died. It just went quiet for a while, waiting for “the resurrection morning”.

Happy Easter.