I feel like, if I were looking to form some timeline of eras or periods in my life, I could chop it in two — before and after I discovered the Cadbury Creme Egg. Before, I think I was pretty content with what the dessert world had to offer, secure in the knowledge that between cupcakes, gummy bears, and ice cream, all the bases were covered. But then along came this chocolate egg filled with what can only be described as sugary ecstasy, and it was though my entire world imploded. Suddenly, the bar for what a dessert was and what it should entail had been raised at least three levels from wherever it was before. Suddenly, the world was a better place.

And if you are one of those people who is going to Debbie Down me right now and be like, “Ugh, I don’t know, I’m not really a dessert person and they’re a little too sweet, you know, a little too rich,” you can take your suitcase full of radishes and quinoa and go sit outside in the rain. This is Easter, the holiday in which absolutely nothing is related to anything, and multi-colored rabbits lay eggs filled with chocolate and toys for children to find in the yard before you go inside to eat marshmallow chickens and then later have a ham dinner. This is for Jesus, clearly. If there’s anything you’re not allowed to be lame about, it’s this holiday. And you know what? When it comes to junk food — I’m pretty sure I have more of a salt tooth than a sweet tooth, but when someone hands you a rich milk chocolate shell filled with gooey fondant that’s made to look like THE ACTUAL INSIDE OF A CHICKEN EGG, you say thank you and you eat it the way God intended.

But here, I’ll compromise. If they’re really just that intense on the sugar front and you can’t take it, have a handful of Cadbury Mini Eggs. They’re structurally just like M & M’s, with the milk chocolate center and the hard sugar shell, but every individual component is of so much higher quality that the end product is like nothing you’ve ever tasted. You sit down in front of a family-size bag of Cadbury Mini Eggs and you think “lol, family, lol” and you eat that whole thing in one sitting because Easter only comes once a year. This isn’t some 365-day excursion of chocolate we’re embarking on, this has a time limit. But if all you can manage this season is the Mini Eggs, you should be ashamed. You should go into your corner with your crappy Palmer’s chocolate rabbit that tastes like wet cardboard and broken dreams, and you should think about all of the delicious confection you’re not strong enough to eat.

Because opening that egg is like looking briefly into the face of God — something that only wants us to be happy, that only sees us at our most innocent and loving. It makes us all children again, if only for a moment, and reminds us that we need to take the little pleasures as they come. The Egg is a treat that comes around for a little while each spring, when the flowers are just beginning to bloom and the birds are singing, unafraid, for the first time since the leaves fell so many months ago. It is a treat that tells us, “Winter is over, my children, come play in the sun.” And by “the sun,” it means the molten orange fondant core at the center of its sugary shell. Thank you, Easter. No matter how bizarre and apropos of nothing your celebrations are, you will always have brought us The Egg, and for that, we salute you.