Being a Mom
A great mother, as I’ve come to view it, does the job without demand for payback or recognition. If she does it well, that’ll come, but inward is not the natural orientation of a mother.
The day to honor mother is lovely and touching yet it strikes me as a bit superfluous. Not that we shouldn’t have it. I enjoy Mother’s Day and love to wish my own daughters “Happy Mother’s Day!” but honestly, to me every day of life, once a mother, is a Mother’s Day.
I find it inspiring to contemplate aspects of an ideal mother, attitudes and gifts she gives. Humor me with my philosophy here and get back to me, please, with yours.
Undentable love or love that bounces back perfectly;
patience (and see the bouncing back quality of love),
judgment that may at times evade us but that is weighted toward the child;
ideals and standards offered with humility and reality;
strength, courage in every facet of living including living with changes that motherhood and childhood are challenged to endure;
expressed appreciation and encouragement;
and the mentality to mastermind this so as to influence the kids without their feeling usurped and taking affront.
There are many other qualities you could add to my list. What are your thoughts?
These spiritual things are part of what moms are all about, though we screw up now and then. I sure have. I know that we don’t always do right but a mother is going to be motivated to attempt to perfect herself for her kids. It helps me to look at what it takes, at what I aspire to. And it helps to forgive myself for when I’ve fallen short. I do know these as ideals, though, for I feel them compellingly.
What I say of a mother can as well be true of a father, assuredly, yet from with male qualities. There are those differences between the roles of the sexes which I feel do naturally exist. The inspirational core of parenting is, though, essentially the same.
How Mother’s Day was Born
The earliest form of Mother’s Day was in honor of, say, a goddess or the church. The holiday took on a human aspect much more recently.
A look into the original intention of Mother’s Day gave it more rounded meaning to me. Mother’s Day started out as one thing and lost its initial impulse over time, no doubt due to the entrance of mass marketing into the celebration.
Julia Ward Howe, who penned “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” became very distraught over the killing of so many sons in the American Civil War. She called for a day during which mothers would discuss and forward peace, to put a stop to the killing of their own and other mothers’ sons. She wanted mothers to take responsibility to not allow war to unlearn all that mothers had bothered to instill in their sons. I admire this impulse greatly. It’s a dynamic thought that extends far beyond just one family but to the family of man.
To quote a portion of what she wrote:
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them then solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace,
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God.
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality
May be appointed and held at some place deemed most convenient
And at the earliest period consistent with its objects
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions.
The great and general interests of peace.
Howe’s gathering of women of many nationalities to promote peace was funded by her but when she didn’t or couldn’t any longer, they fizzled out.
In 1908, Anna Jarvis wished to honor her deceased mother and promote peace with an official Mother’s Day celebration at the church where her mom had taught Sunday School for over 20 years. Anna arranged for two white carnations, her mother’s favorite flower, to be given to each mother attending. The white carnation now signifies the celebration of the life of a deceased mother; a red or pink carnation honors a living mother. Mother’s Day began, although not yet officially. In 1908 a Nebraska senator proposed making this a national holiday at the request of the Young Men’s Christian Assoc. (YMCA). It was defeated but the next year nearly every state (46 of them) celebrated the holiday. Anna Jarvis then devoted herself full-time to lobbying for the creation of a national holiday. In 1912 W est VA officially adopted it and in 1914 Woodrow Wilson signed Mother’s Day into law, designated as the second Sunday in May.
The initial focus on peace and women promoting world peace has been waylaid, hasn’t it, tough? I would like to see the holiday oriented once again toward mothers as a group and a force in society for peace.
Happy Mother’s Day and much love to you! Evan