As we all know, the next two months contain two special days:
Mother's Day -- May 11th
and
Father's Day -- June 15th.
Most people have their own personal “historical considerations” of these two holidays – e.g., the family taking Mom out to her favorite restaurant, her poised at the head of the table, and the family putting on a special barbeque for Dad, everyone centered around him in a new lounge chair. Nonetheless, these two special days have interesting histories.
Regarding Mother’s Day, people in many ancient cultures celebrated holidays honoring motherhood, personified as a goddess. Here are just a few of those: (1) ancient Greeks celebrated a holiday in honor of Rhea, the mother of the gods; (2) ancient Romans celebrated a holiday in honor of Cybele, a mother goddess, March 22-25; these celebrations were notorious enough that followers of Cybele were banished from Rome in the British Isles; and (3) in Celtic Europe, the goddess Brigid, and later her successor St. Brigid, were honored with a spring Mother’s Day, connected with the first milk of the ewes. Other aspects of the history and awe of Mother’s Day can be found in the following interesting sites:
* Mothering Sunday in Britain
* Mothers' Work Days
* Julia Ward Howe’s Mother's Day
* Anna Jarvis and Mother’s Day
* Carnations, Anna Jarvis, and Mother’s Day
* International Mother’s Days Today
* Mother’s Day Statistics
* Mother’s Day Proclamations
* Famous Mothers
* Quotes on Mothers and Motherhood
* Ideas for Mother’s Day
* Motherhood in History
Regarding Father’s Day, in 1926 a National Father’s Day Committee was formed in
* Father’s Day at Alphabet Soup
* Barbara’s Entourage – A Tribute to Father
* Billy Bear’s Happy Father’s Day
* Marvelicious Happy Father’s Day
* Father’s Day on the Net - Welcome
* National Center for Fathering
* Father’s Day at 20ishParents.com
Today, with the assistance of my publisher, I set up a special Website discount for my pop-psych book, Mom and Dad’s Pearls of Wisdom… You Gotta Love ’Em, with a Promo Code: MD0801 for my blog fans to purchase this book up to June 15th at a 25% discount. Furthermore, if you go to my Website and click on the link for this book, you will find that there now are 10 of the book’s 50 Chapters available for your reading pleasure, free. I trust that you will enjoy reading these Sample Chapters.
Interestingly, this week I received an e-mail from a fan who said, “Last year I bought a copy of Mom and Dad’s Pearls of Wisdom… You Gotta Love ’Em for my mom – she loved it! This year, sad to say, my mom’s no longer with us. However, I’m going to buy two books this year – one for my daughter… who is a Mom, and one for my son… who is a Dad.”
Question: Do Mother’s Day and Father’s Day have any special “historical considerations” for you?
Bill
2 comments:
Hi Bill - Okay my comment here will answer your question - You started off with 'as we all know the next two months contain two special days:' -- My brain went..."They do? What? What month are we in again(literally thinking over things like we're past christmas..." Then laughed when I read the 'mother's' day and 'father's' day answer. =) Obviously I've never put much weight on those dates. =)
Hope your adjusting to your new computer!
Cole
Hi Cole,
As usual, you brought a smile to my face – we live in such a fast-paced world, sometimes it’s hard to look beyond anything 72 hours ahead.
I’ve always valued Mother’s Day and Father’s Day because it was an opportunity to treat my parents special. While I tried to treat them special all the time, maybe for me it was just a “Special-Special.”
My new computer is wonderful – the old dog, nonetheless, is working hard to “learn all the new tricks.”
Be well, Cole, and thanks again for the visit.
‘til next time,
Bill
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