A Mother's Day

The concept of Mother's Day is a good one... Mom, appreciated for all that she does, gets to spend a relaxing day being adored by her family.  This all sounds so great, however, I wonder how often it actually happens?  I noticed this week that as the other moms that I work with talked about plans for the upcoming weekend, no one seemed to be kicked back and relaxing...more like frantically racing around all week to get things ready.  Cookouts, dinners, brunches, coordinating gifts, etc...  Everyone seemed to be doing the thing that mothers do best...finding ways to take care of everyone (and everything) else.

Taking care of people IS just part of being a mom...  Our first priority tends to be making sure our families have what they need, when they need it, and are completely comfortable.  We do those things the same way our mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers did them for their families (including us) before them...  And on Mother's Day we take over the responsibility for coordinating the gathering and the gifts because we want to make sure that our mothers, grandmothers, and special women in our lives are celebrated...we want to be sure that they feel like they can relax and are adored by their family.  And, let's face it, we don't believe that the "boys" will just take care of all of that if we leave it to them...although they might if we gave them a chance (which we don't/won't)?

So the question is this... On Mother's Day...do we really want to be pampered and taken care of?  I mean, it sounds good, really it does, but is that really what we are after?  I think mothers just want to know (at least on one day) that what we do all the rest of the days is recognized and matters...we want to believe that our families appreciate us for taking care of the "mom" things.  And if that means that we need to coordinate the picnic and pick up the gifts for the women in our lives, well that is just part of what we do.  What is most important is that our moms know we love them and value all they do for us.

My Mother's Day?  Well, having attended the family picnic the day before (with gifts and dishes-to-pass in hand, by the way), the day is anticipated to be a quiet one spent with O.  She brought home a hand-made card from school (already on the fridge) and informed me that for Mother's Day she is going to sing me "happy birthday, because that is what you do on Mother's Day".  This is sure to be a perfect day...so long as I don't actually have to HAVE two birthdays this year, I could not ask for a better way to spend my day.