Mothers and Mothers Day

Today is the 100th birthday of Mothers Day and the woman who started it all is barely remembered. We have instead turned this day into a profitable one for the card companies, florists, candy stores and restaurants. Yet the woman who started it all is merely a footnote in history and the original history of this day has been forgotten as well. Mothers Day is a holiday owing to strong feminist roots and the determination of one very special woman.

According to the National Geographic , in West Virginia in the 1850’s, a women’s organizer, Ann Reeves Jarvis, held mothers days work clubs to improve sanitary conditions and lower infant mortality by reducing milk contamination. The groups also tended wounded soldiers on both sides during the latter years of the Civil War. After the war, Jarvis and others organized Mother’s Friendship Day picnics and other events to create harmony.

After Jarvis died in 1905, her daughter Anna began holding similar friendship days in her hometown of Grafton, WV. Due to her efforts, Mothers Day was observed throughout the country. In 1914, President Woodrow Wilson set aside the second Sunday in May for the holiday. This was to be a day set aside not to celebrate all mothers but for people to celebrate the best mother they’ve ever known be it a mother, father or friend.

Unfortunately Anna Jarvis vision was bastardized by the card, candy and flower companies. This was hurtful and deeply troubling for Jarvis. She organized boycotts, threatened lawsuits and went after public officials she felt were destroying the original intent of Mother’s Day. Her fight continued well until she died in 1948, penniless and suffering dementia, in Philadelphia’s Marshall Square Sanitarium. Today Mother’s Day continues to be of the most profitable holidays in the US. The National Retail Federation estimates $19.9 billion dollars will be spent this year. The National Restaurant Association states that Mother’s Day is year’s most popular day to dine out. Hallmark states Mother’s Day is the third largest card giving holiday after Christmas and Valentine’s Day. It is second only to Christmas as the most gifts giving holiday.

What started as an American holiday has spread to other parts of the world. The Arab world celebrates Mother’s Day March 21st. Panama’s celebration is December 8th and in Thailand, Mother’s Day is August 12 and Great Britain Mothering Day is celebrated the fourth Sunday during Lent. Anna Jarvis’ ode to her mother has become a worldwide phenomenon and a pantheon to consumerism. Not too shabby for a woman from West Virginia and not at all what she had in mind.

Personally I don’t celebrate Mother’s Day. There are two very important reasons why. First, I’m a mother 24/7. Just like I pray and thank God daily, I believe children should do the same for their mothers. Not a day goes by when I stop being a mother to my son. I’m special and I believe as such, I should be acknowledged on a day of my own, not one I have to share with women all over. You want to wish me Happy Mother’s Day? Do it on July 28th or January 17th or any other day I don’t have to share. Am I being ridiculous and selfish? Maybe. I don’t apologize for it because I’m a mother. I may never be some of the many things I want to be. But I will always be a mother. There are mothers all over the world and I applaud them. But I’m mother to my son and will be until death and beyond. I’ve earned that title and continue to earn that title because as a mother, I’m as infinite as time itself.

The other reason why I don’t celebrate Mother’s Day now is because I never have. My mother died when I was six so there was never anyone I made homemade cards for or gift boxes or trays or any of the myriad homemade projects kids made in school. I had wonderful mother substitutes and my father was amazing. Every event a girl shared with her mother, I shared with my dad including the Mother-Daughter fashion show at Girl Scouts, buying a first bra and buying the first pair of heels and stockings. For those of us who grew up without a mother, this day is a painful reminder of what never was. My mother didn’t get to see me attend my senior prom, never see me graduate from high school or college, never saw me walk down the aisle, never experienced my pregnancy and never got to help me become the woman I am. For me, this day is a reflection of what never was and never will be.

For those of you who do celebrate this day, I hope it’s a good one. I hope you’ve shown your mothers just how special she is and what she means to you. If you have someone in your life that has been like a mother to you, I hope you’ve shared with that person what a wonderful inspiration she has been to you. I wish that each of you who celebrates with your mother or aunt or grandmother or special friend makes the time and the effort to show your love and appreciation every day. Life is too short for anything less.