The origin of Mother’s Day goes much further back than 1914 when President Wilson declared the second Sunday in May to be a celebration of mothers in the U.S. In the UK, Mother’s Day has much longer been celebrated in March, originally intended to encourage people to visit their Mother Church on the second Sunday of Lent. Journeying to one’s hometown might include a visit to one’s human mother as well as to the church where one was nurtured and made their first communion. Those visits often involved bringing flowers to both “mothers.”
Our American Mother’s Day has always included the white carnation which was the favorite flower of the mother of Anna Jarvis, the woman who started the observance in the United States. In March of 1908, Anna sent hundreds of white carnations to her mother’s church to honor her memory. As the idea spread and others began imitating the practice, it became popular to not only honor the memory of one’s deceased mother with white carnations, but to honor living mothers with pink ones. With the passage of time, children of both living and deceased mothers took to wearing flowers of the “correct” color to church on Mother’s Day. Carnations also adorn many graves of mothers nationwide on that day. The fact that everybody has (or had) a mother is, no doubt, the reason the observance has made this the busiest time of the year for flower shops, surpassing even Valentine’s Day.
While our Mother’s Day date varies, it is always observed on the second Sunday of May, other countries celebrate at different times, often on a set date. Such is the Mexican version of the day which always occurs on May 10. Celebrations there include music, food and family gatherings which honor the mother as Queen of the House. It is the busiest day of the year for restaurants in Mexico.
Because May 10th and the second Sunday in May are never too many days apart on the calendar, the thought occurred to me that most years, we have two chances to celebrate and perhaps, a solution to the problem of which mother married couples should celebrate with on this special day. As in Mexico, many American families prefer to treat Mom to dinner in a restaurant rather than at home. Including the whole family with children of all ages can be not only expensive in a nice restaurant, but chaotic as well – not such a treat for Mom. With two available dates, we have the opportunity to treat her to a nice dinner out while avoiding her having to cook on her special day. Then, we can have the family celebration with music, pot-luck, grandkids, and favorite family dishes at home (after all, we need her to cook those special family favorites that nobody else makes quite as well.) Since as in Mexico, our Mother’s Day is one of the busiest Sundays of the year for restaurants, it makes sense to make that reservation for May 10th and have the family celebration on the assured second Sunday when most families are available to get together. Only rarely will the two occur on the same day – use your imagination then.
Some of my own Mother’s Day memories are firmly attached to other events such as the spring my parents moved us into the big, white house on the acreage of their dreams. We had been living in the house since early March and Mother’s Day that year was on May 14th, about a month after my tenth birthday. The house had been occupied for several years by short-term renters, leaving it in a state of dirty neglect; there was much work to be done to make it livable. Our parents and my older sister and I had no time for leisure even on weekends, and we totally forgot about Mother’s Day – until we took time out to read the Sunday papers. Guilt raised its ugly head and we never again forgot.
My first Mother’s Day as a mother myself was in 1957, the same day we brought our first baby home from the hospital. Both sets of grandparents arrived that afternoon. My mother brought freshly-picked strawberries from her garden and an angel food cake to celebrate; my mother-in-law brought her apron and stayed two weeks to help out, as she did when all her grandchildren were born.
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