Double dipping Mother’s Day
Happy Mother’s Day to all of you celebrating today and to all of you who celebrated this past Sunday. Here on the border, you are all likely into this. There are headaches, literally, about living on the border: poor air quality, long lines to cross, toasty summers. You know the list. But this is a benefit so why not take advantage of it?
Mother’s Day in the United States falls on the second Sunday of May.
It’s celebrated, yet differently, in some 40 countries. In Great Britain it’s known as Mothering Sunday and is not connected to the U. S. Mother’s Day. It’s an older holiday in Europe, and in Britain, it’s tied to Lent when children returned to their mother church.
The founder of Mother’s Day in the United States, Anna Jarvis, began it as a church service celebration in 1907 as a memorial to her mother. Thus, she was disappointed as it became commercialized. Just Google it. What pops up are ads, and I stand guilty of supporting this commercialism. Not in a big way, but commercial we are in the good ole U. S. of A.
I like flowers — both growing them and giving store bought bouquets. Mother’s Day provides a long weekend of giving flowers. So we simultaneously celebrate Mothers and springtime, and fill the house with beautiful color.
The roses bought last week have now wilted so my dear wife brings them to the cemetery to place on her mother’s grave. The cemetery is crowded as Mexicans, more than Americans, celebrate their dear ones who have passed. I think of my mother and father frequently, but I don’t visit their graves. Even if I lived in the same city where they are buried, I don’t think I would be a regular visitor. Very different cultural attitudes, which I don’t fully understand.
El Dia de la Madre is always celebrated on May 10 in Mexico, and it is increasingly celebrated in the United States by Mexican-Americans and Mexicans living here. You don’t have to live on the border to be a double dipper.
At the preschool where my dear wife works, it’s been a veritable Santa’s workshop this past week. The teachers have had the children making Mother’s Day gifts: tote bags with hand prints, photos of the individual children and art work that only a mother can appreciate as genius.
And, of course, the children will sign for their mothers today at school.
These celebrations are how it should be. Moms raise the kids and do the majority of the housework. Since the 1960s and the easing of divorce laws, moms are often the breadwinner in single- parent households.
It’s a balancing act whether a single or married working mom. There are the kids, the house care, and work, often professional, that requires
100 percent attention. All cultures share the fact that moms are the first teachers of their children. As the World Bank reports, better-educated mothers know more about nutrition and healthcare; thus they raise healthier children. If they are literate, they can teach their children to read and write even before the kids enter school.
You’ve probably seen that bumper sticker, “If you can read this, thank a teacher.” There’s even an older saying, “If you are an early learner, thank your mom.”