Mothering Sunday? Mothers' Day

Hi, Sons and Daughters everywhere.     When I was little and  pretty much into my early teens Mothering Sunday had religious overtones and I think we did tend to do something nice for Mummy whether we went to Church or not.   The concept puzzled me and as a child my imagination took off and I had vivid pictures of what 'Mothering' was all about.  It goes back to the 16th century when in the fourth Sunday in Lent people went to the biggest church in their area - the Mother Church - for a special service. In the 19th century servants were give the day off to go and visit their Mother; but now it's just a huge game, and boy how the shops have chimed in and had a field day!  Now it's a vast retail enterprise.   This year, looking at catalogues, I found the oddest suggestions for presents for  our dearest - from chain-saws to pretty ladies sitting in bed surrounded by every conceivable goodie.   Who is this ultra-glamorous  lady?  Is she Mother's newest Mistress of the Bedchamber? Ideally, of course, those of us who love our Mothers shouldn't need this obvious prompting to send our Mother a present - some flowers or her own special treat; but I guess that if we didn't have the awful retail hype to remind us we might well forget, and who knows,even her birthday might go by the board.   After Derek and I were married the Mother's Day thing was beginning to get into gear, and living some 250 miles away it wasn't always possible to  spend the day together . . .   Derek resolved that,  and every year without fai, he consulted his muse and wrote a Mother's Day Poem which always had Mother as the central character doing something totally outrageous like getting blind drunk on gallons of gin, going to the Zoo and taking an elephant out for walkies - things of this sort.    These pieces of doggerel  were extremely popular and a wonderful way round having to spend extremely additionally hyped- up expensive bouquets or whatever.   The whole family would always have a great laugh.   So there you go, you budding poets, if your Mother's got a great sense of humour you'll know what to do next year when the big day comes round - its March 15th 2015!  bye for now Happy Mother's day -from Julia