Why Are Easter Traditions So Weird?

Easter traditions confuse the hell out of me.

Some holiday traditions are self explanatory.

New Years and the 4th of July: Fireworks and alcohol. It's a celebration! America's birthday and the birth of a new year; party it up!

Valentine's Day: Hearts, candy, cupid. It's a holiday about expressing your love (hearts) for your sweetheart (sweets...candy....get it?).

Mother's Day/Father's Day: Self explanatory.

Thanksgiving: Coming together as a family and having a nice family meal that puts you into a coma until Black Friday, at which point everything you were thankful for on Thanksgiving goes straight out the window when a giant flat screen is 90% off and there's only 2 left.

Christmas...well, Christmas confuses me about as much as Easter does....

I think Jim Gaffigan described it best when he said that Christmas traditions sound like something a drunk man would do:

"We go out and we chop down a tree, and we put it in our living room. Kinda sounds like the behavior of a drunk man, really. Some woman wakes up, 'Honey, why is there a...a pine tree....in our living room?' 'I LIKE IT! We're gonna- We're gonna- We're gonna decorate it. For Jesus. And then I'm gonna hang my socks over the fireplace. Fill 'em with candy. Maybe I'll tie some leaves to the ceiling; see if I can get some action.'"

But Easter has always confused me. (Like Christmas)

I get that Jesus died and then rose from the dead three days later and we celebrate that on Sunday.

But what does ANY of that have to do with a giant rabbit leaving eggs everywhere and then breaking into your house to leave gifts that will fit in a basket??

1. WHAT DOES ANY OF THAT HAVE TO DO WITH JESUS???

2. I don't know what school YOU went to, but RABBITS DON'T LAY EGGS.

3. Eggs are not made of chocolate NOR do they sometimes have candy or money in them. Why would you think that? Why would you EVER think that?

4. WHY ARE BASKETS INVOLVED? And why does this Santa-Wanna-Be Rabbit only have gifts that will fit inside said basket???

5. Why are the eggs hidden? Is it some sort of metaphor? Like, "If we hide them well enough, it'll take the kids 3 days to find them. And then when they do find them we'll be like 'And that's how long it took Jesus to rise from the dead!' It'll be a learning experience!" Or are the rabbits hiding them so that we don't know that they indeed DO lay eggs?

I am always so confused around Easter when I see decorations go up and all of these questions go through my head.

How did we as a society come to just accept this as normal?

"Yeah, Easter. We all dress nice, go to church. After church Bunny lays the eggs, hides the eggs, kids find the eggs, fun stuff is in the eggs. Praise Jesus."

I have so many questions. But also I'm not complaining. I mean, it's free stuff.

As a kid, when you wake up one morning and there's just free stuff for you left over night you don't think "How did this stuff get here? Why is it here? Who put it here?" No. You think "SCORE! FREE STUFF!!!" And if someone says "Hey, a magical giant bunny broke into our house and left presents because Jesus came back." I wouldn't question it. I'd believe anything you said as long as free presents were involved. You could tell me a flaming elephant called the Vegetable Fairy materialized through the air vents and left presents because it's 'Harvesting Day' and I'd be like "SWEET! Harvesting Day is the BEST! Thanks Vegetable Fairy!"

...And that's the story of Easter.

(No it's not.)