When my brother and I were kids, we'd wake up on Easter morning to a trail of white cotton balls that led from our room to the living area. It was almost as exciting as Christmas morning, except the trail led, not to a tree overladen with gifts, but to two huge baskets full of chocolate bunnies, candy and almost anything else you could think of that would cause the Tooth Fairy to pay a visit after the Easter Bunny made his departure. It is a memory that I have carried with me for years. My mom never let any holiday pass without some sort of celebration. Every occasion was met with greeting cards. Greeting cards were her specialty. There was always one ready to be mailed to someone as they marked whatever milestone was on the calendar. It's something I do to this day. There's something special about writing and sending a Hallmark. I know it's the new world of texts and emails, but nothing beats sending someone a real card in the mail.

The memories of what my mom did for me are forever with me, and when John agreed to come visit over Easter Weekend of 2022, I didn't even think twice about what I was going to do to make him feel welcome.

"You're making a what?" my friend Debra asked as we walked around Target. 

"It's just a basket," I replied. "He's flying all this way, I have to make him feel at home."

"Yes, but this is a bit more than that, don't you think?" she persisted when she saw that I had not only chosen gluten free treats, but items like Gluten Free Pasta, a collection of stories by Edgar Allan Poe, one of his favorite authors, and of course, a small jigsaw puzzle - because I still couldn't quite put my finger on this mystery. Every time I told Debra I was in Target, I was met with the same response.

"What else are you buying for the basket?"

In all honesty, I didn't go to purposely find things to add. Things just happened that way.

Then I thought, well, I just can't have the basket sitting on the table. And that's when I remembered the bunny trail my mom used to assemble. But, since color is such an important part of my life, I couldn't just use regular white cotton balls. And of course, no matter what store I searched, I came up empty. Once again, it was Amazon to the rescue. As the weekend approached, the basket was finally assembled, the trail extending from the table to the front door to the steps outside. John's flight was due to land at 5pm. And as I sat at the stop light not far from my apartment, I got a text. STOP. We're turning back to the gate.

And so began the next few hours of would he or wouldn't he arrive in time to salvage the long weekend. I even called my friend in Arizona to see if John could spend the night at his condo if his flight wasn't able to leave his layover city of Phoenix. As the sun set, I was getting less and less confident that the Texan would make it to LA, but four hours later, when he texted that his flight had finally gotten take off clearance, I double checked the bunny trail and headed out to LAX. Unfortunately, it was so dark by the time he landed, I was afraid the outside cotton balls would be hard to see.

This was the first time we'd seen each other since he left Palm Springs, and as I stood waiting at baggage claim with Welcome balloons and a smaller Easter basket -- yes, there was another basket -- I suddenly was in a panic. I had a boy coming to visit me. I couldn't even get one to drive up from Palm Springs or make the drive an hour away in the valley to come to Toluca Lake. And here was one flying in from Texas! I was getting more nervous by the minute as person after person came around the corner to the baggage carousels. And, then, there he was - as pocket sized as I remembered him, with his bag in one hand and a big smile on his face. I attribute that to the balloons, though.

Our conversation was just as easy as it was when we had met a few weeks earlier. My biggest disappointment was that by the time we'd gotten back home, it was too dark to see the trail of cotton balls that led from the driveway into my apartment.