Mother's Day Zen

[susandennis]

For some reason that I honestly can't nail, Mother's Day always annoys the shit out of me.

I don't think it's about missing my mother. She's been dead now for nearly a decade and while I'd be happy if she were here, I'm really more grateful for having had her so long rather than really missing her.

I don't think it's about my not having any children. I honestly do not remember a single time, even when I was little, ever wanting to have children.  At all. Nothing. Not even a tiny bit. I've always considered my not having any as my gift to any children I might have had. I have skills over a wide range of things... motherhood ain't anywhere in that mix.  And, no, I do NOT consider Zoey - or any animal - my 'child'.

Maybe it's just being left out. My spam, my web reading, billboards, snail mail... it's all about Mother's Day and so not in any even tiny way about me.

In year's past, I've just been pissed. This year, I'm trying a combo of ignoring all the Mother's Day shit and just letting it wash over me.  I have to say that so far, I've been only moderately successful.

---

Swimming today is at 11. The baseball game is at night and then, I've been ask to join some guys from Australia in an online gathering. They want to hear about the early days of the internet from a user perspective. The timezones have this at 11 pm my time which is past my bedtime and will make getting up for the 6 am swim a bit of a kink but no biggie. Should be fun and interesting enough to be worth it.

Comments

[badrobot68.livejournal.com]

I think it's just one of those fake holidays to make people buy cards and flowers. Not that moms don't deserve that, but why have one special day?

[susandennis]

Oh! You are right! I was focused the wrong way. Thank goodness for one special day or I'd be pissed all the time!!

[badrobot68.livejournal.com]

HA!

[tatjna.livejournal.com]

Yep.

I also have some vaguely feminist ideas about the gender-normativity of Mother's Day buying into some idea that women's value is in motherhood, and the whole concept of raising parenthood above other forms of contribution to society as something to be celebrated. But those might be a bit of a reach. ;-)

[susandennis]

BUT WAIT! It's NOT a reach. You just nailed it. Yes, a woman's value is in motherhood. And, since, I'm not a mother, my value equals nothing.

(It always annoys me when just the word 'mother' makes any human better than another - and it happens 9835 times a day - at least that's how many times, I hear/read it.)

Yep, that's what I've been trying to noodle out. Thank you.

[tatjna.livejournal.com]

I am a mother, and I also find it annoying and frustrating. Not so much now but when the YoT was little, he was expected to be my only focus, and wanting to continue doing things that enhanced my own wellbeing or pursue my own interests outside of motherhood apparently made me a bad person. Like my identity was supposed to be subsumed beneath the great overarching MOTHER.

It didn't work. I suck at being someone else just for the sake of expectations - especially unrealistic ones that remove my agency to decide for myself where my value is.

Oddly enough, my supposedly deeply neglected kid who went to daycare or his Grandma so I could work/go fishing/whatever has turned out just fine.

/rant

[badrobot68.livejournal.com]

Oh, I agree with you as well. :)

Obligation

[spiritgirl.livejournal.com]

For me it's the whole obligation thing about these made up holidays. I KNOW I am expected to at least call or go see my mother, preferably buy her something....and she has no shortage of particular things she does and does not want. I HATE that! And I get so caught up in my obligation that I don't want anything from my kids because I don't want them in bondage either. I would much rather have an unscheduled day in which it is pure joy to share time together or give something that is really wanted and or needed.

I HATE valentines day for the same reason....it's bullshit. I'll express my love when and how I feel like it....not because anyone makes me feel like scum if I don't do it in one of the following ways on this particular day. Screw that!

Re: Obligation

[susandennis]

amen!

[rsc.livejournal.com]

For most of my life I considered it an obligation to call my mother on Mother's Day -- which struck me as a bit silly, since it's always within a few days of my birthday, on which she always called me. Sometime in my 40s or 50s I discovered that she thought it was silly also.

My father, on the other hand, had long since made it clear that he had no interest in any acknowledgement of Father's Day.