FROM MAMAS, MUTHAS, TO MOTHERS DAY

Mothering is a transitive verb meaning:  to care for or protect like a mother (though the fist meaning is to have given birth).  Maternal instinct, probably normally, should be present in all females.  However, Nature has its anomalies, one of them being that culture has a lot to do with caretaking of the young

"Many people mistakenly believe that litters of kittens can have only one father, and that tom cats will always kill kittens, if given the chance."  Both are myths.  Jennifer Copley wrote an article on Tomcats and Kittens.from which the previous sentence was quoted.  Neither belief is accurate and you can read the full article by clicking here.

The mistake we have made as humans is to assume that God tells some of us what is right and wrong for Mankind and Nature.  Man tends to anthropomorphize and is too often mistaken by assuming that Nature runs on man-made morality.  It does not, nor does Nature make all women motherly, nor does it make all of a woman's children perceive her as 'motherly' as we expect her to be warm, caring, protective and all those good things.

What of the mother who beats or tortures her children?  Having worked in a mental hospital, I saw many anomalies to the notion of perfect mothers.  I have watched the siblings of a child murdered by their mother.  I talked with a mother who felt she had to kill her husband for the mental cruelty he had delivered to her.  She planned to shoot him with the shotgun he kept loaded in their living room but could not do that and let her children live to cope with being orphans as she also planned to shoot herself.  Thus, she killed them as well as her husband and turned the gun on herself but failed to manage more than blowing her shoulder out and staying alive.  The courts could not believe a sane mother could shoot her children so she was sentenced  to a mental hospital.  In fact, she knew exactly what she was doing and had done, escaped the hospital and succeeded in committing suicide later,

Our society talks of racial and terrorist profiling.  We do not consider all the profiling we do about parents.  Those who work in grade and middle schools get a fist hand look at how lacking in maternalism some childrens' mothers are.

Our colloquialisms make merry with mothers with the most collossal insult one can give by degrading his/her mother.  We hear an iteration of 'mammy jammer', men insulted by being called 'mutha', shorthand for being a person who would have intimate, physical relations with his mother.  Yet, when all is said and done, there are most tears shed over the mothers who did their job well.  More tears for her having aged beyond her ability to be the mother they had depended on for so many years.  The lessons taught, which at the time annoyed them were understood and valued only when they became parents themselves.when they could  appreciate the difficult task it is to be a mother.  Only since WWII have mothers juggles child rearing, housework, the increased demands by the schools for parental participation when mothers now work when they hadn't worked pre-War.  If a mother was really good, her children thought she never tired, lived for them only, .forever enjoying their endless requests,

Fortunately, more women fit the proper profule than not and we celebrate them on a Sunday in May as 'Mothers Day'.  Like all Holidays that were invented have been taken over by merchants, It is a day to buy presents, often flowers or candy.  Mothers expect to hear from their offspring whether it is the stick figure on a folded piece of construction paper by the 1st grader or the expensive floral arrangement chosen and sent by the secretary, or wife,  of the Executive, too-busy-to-do-it-himself, son.  Many years later, retailers who are not to be outdone by only one gifting day added Fathers Day in June.  Years later, grandparents got into the act and have their day in September.

But tomorrow is for Mother's....all mothers.  It is not reserved for your mother only.  Mothers whose children don't remember that their mothers like to have confirmation that what they did for their children was appreciated, as well as mothers who think they did a great job when they may not have but do not want to hear the reality. Whichever category you are in, remember your mother  by reaching out and touching her in whatever way works for you....a visit, a phone call, a card, an e-mail....isn't it wonderful that there are so many choices with which to make it is to do?