Mother’s Day 2015 is officially over. This was my first Mother’s Day after my mom’s death. For years I have listened to people whose moms have passed talk about how hard Mother’s Day is for them. Often I’ve been irritated by people who wish me “Happy Mother’s Day” assuming that I am a mother. I know that they mean well, but as we know every woman is not a mother.
On this first Mother’s Day without a mom to honor and no children to honor me, I decided to do something that I have thought about for years. I had my first motherless and childless brunch. The only way to make the invite list was by not having a living mother and to have never had a child. I keep the list small for the first year, but this may turn in to a bigger event than I thought. Before the day was over people were asking how they could make the list for next year. As we get older there are more and more of us without mothers and I’m surprised how many of my contemporaries do not have children.
Mother’s Day 2015 was a beautiful day as far as weather. I planned for the brunch to begin at 11 a.m., just in case anyone wanted to run the Race for Cure. I prepared a sausage casserole, home fried potatoes, bacon, cherry turnovers, fresh fruit, coffee and mimosas. One friend brought a homemade lemon meringue pie. I thought about putting out a box of Kleenex but decided against it. The day was not full of tears or sad moments, but fun and fellowship. Of course we talked about fun times growing up and warm memories of our mothers but it was a good day. One funny story that we shared was about our mothers making us wear slips under our clothes. Do you know how hard it is now to find a slip? We had to provide one to the funeral home for my mom and slips take a little bit of work to find. I don’t even own a slip anymore. I remember the time my mother made me wear one of her slips on a date. At the time I wore a size 6 and she wore a 16. I tried to pin the slip with a safety pin but mid-way during the date it fell down around my ankles.
For years I have felt so left out on Mother’s Day and I was sure there are others who felt the same so this was the year I decided to do something about it. As I shared my plans with others a lot of people seemed to think this was a great idea and many sound like they will duplicate it. If Hallmark gets a hold of it I hope I will get some credit for the new holiday, maybe I should design my own line of motherless childless greeting cards and get a jump on the situation. Stay tuned this may be a movement.
(Email the columnist at debbienorrell@aol.com)
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