My sister-in-law calls me the worst Jew ever: I like shrimp, pork, cheeseburgers, and goyish holidays like Christmas and Easter. Okay, Christmas is a gimmee - how can you NOT like Christmas? Especially with the retail world trying to secularize it so badly. It's become just a nice day where you get presents and eat and see your family and friends and their decorated houses.

But Easter? Most of my Jewish friends don't get that. You know, with the whole "resurrection of the messiah" thing going on that day. But when I was a kid, I didn't really think about all that. I went to my step-grandparents' house and hunted for painted eggs and ate chocolate bunnies. My step-brother and I got dressed up and spent the day with our family. It was nice, we got candy, and the weather was usually good. I have lovely memories of that. And yes, my entire family is Jewish.

Maybe some Christians would take offense at all this, but that's not how I mean it. I respect their beliefs, even if I don't hold to them, and I certainly don't mean to denegrate their holy days by trivializing them into presents and candy. But I think that the real importance of holidays is spending them with your loved ones, and that's what my family did - even the holidays we didn't actually "follow".

Now I'm married to an ex-Catholic, and we spend Easter and Christmas with his side of the family. My parents are a little bummed, but they understand: the ones who actually believe in these holidays get dibs, just like they get dibs on Passover and Yom Kippur. My mother-in-law gives everyone Easter baskets filled with candy and goodies, and we all sit down to a nice big dinner. And I'm making new memories of family holidays that I'll be able to share with my own child.

It's the Circle of Holiday Life. With chocolate. :)