Mother's Day

May 14, 2012

Yesterday was Mothers' Day, but Catherine's graduation took precedence!

I have mixed feelings about this day.  Don't misunderstand; I think it's great that we have a day to celebrate mothers.  However, the commercialism of the day and the Let's Make Everyone Feel Guilty and Inadequate nature of the media make it a day of obligation instead of a day of celebration.   I've always disliked the "you better get Mom flowers, take her out to eat, buy her lots of gifts-just-for-the-sake-of-getting-her-a-gift" idea of this day.  The price of flowers is always jacked up for this day, the restaurants are packed and noisy and falsely happy, and gifts are, to me, often uncomfortable.  Over the past 22 years there are several Mother's Days that stand out in my mind as particularly beautiful.  This year was one of those, as I got to spend the day with my Mom and with Catherine, while celebrating Catherine's commencement from Sewanee and her entrance into the "adult" world (and I got this nifty mug that I absolutely LOVE).  Two years ago I was feeling a little down as the weekend approached.  However, it turned out to be one of the best MD celebrations because Catherine surprised me by coming home for the weekend and staying until Monday.  My choice of celebrations for that Sunday was to take a picnic and go to the beach for sunset with Catherine and Wayne.  Another year Catherine came to me with a "menu" of choices for my breakfast in bed, which she fixed and then crawled into bed to eat it with me.   One year, when we lived in Savannah, my request was for an ugly tree in the front yard to be dug up and replaced with a Maple tree, which Steve and Catherine did!  There have been many memorable celebrations, but those are the highlights.
The greatest gift I ever got for Mother's Day was the year I got Catherine two months before the day we celebrate mothers.