Shaver's Razor

Today’s post is a special guest post from my wife, Elaina Shaver. Just in time for Easter! We hope today’s blog post helps you find an appreciation for all the things that make your parents just who they are.

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Ever since I was a little girl, my mom has carried out the grand southern tradition of wearing a hat on Easter.  This is a tradition that has fallen somewhat out of practice for whatever reason…fashion trends of the day or churches with casual dress codes or just disinterest, but not with my mom.  There have only been a very few Easters in my memory that she has ever gone without her Easter hat.  And don’t forget there is also the very enjoyable and grand tradition of shopping for the perfect Easter dress, shoes, purse and matching jewelry that goes along with the hat tradition. 

When I was little I wore actual Easter bonnets and I don’t mind telling you, I was adorable!  But as I got older and became more and more self-conscience of what others might or might not be thinking about me, I stopped wearing hats.  I was also utterly mortified that my mom continued to wear a hat when no one else would. 

Why on Earth would she want to do something that no one else was doing? Why would she want to have everyone looking at her and seeing how different she was?  Why was she doing this to me???

I was the girl with the mom who wore hats on Easter! 

Oh, the embarrassment I felt as a teenager!!!

You see in those days, I didn’t connect with my mom.  I loved her very much, but we had different ideas about what clothes were cute (or appropriate) and we fought a lot about stuff.  Even as I write this it’s hard to remember what we fought about…

But all in all we didn’t talk much, we didn’t connect much and we didn’t really get along well so the Easter hat debacle was generally just icing on the embarrassing cake.

I’m not sure when it happened, but I started opening up to my mom in college.  We stopped fighting.  I started to understand her more. Moving away from home and having to do things on your own have a way of making you appreciate the times when you had help…especially from your mom. 

And then it happened.  When I went home for Easter my freshman year of college I proudly wore an Easter hat with my mom.  Then the next year I brought my best friend home with me and we all wore hats.  The year after that I brought my best friend AND my roommate. And since then there hasn’t been a year that we haven’t carried on this grand tradition.

You see my search for an Easter Bonnet had very little to do with a hat.  My search was for my mom, for a deeper relationship with her: to understand her more and therefore understand myself more.

Where is my Mom?  She’s the one wearing the fantastic Easter hat.  Where am I?  Well I’m the one wearing a fantastic hat right next to her.