Happy Mother's Day!!

Sometimes it's really great having two nationalities!

Today is Mother's Day in the Republic of Ireland - Happy Day to all my Irish friends! (as well as in Gibraltar, the United Kingdom, and Nigeria).  Special person that I am, I will get to celebrate another Mother's Day the second Sunday in May- the 9th- when I plan to be in the US moving my mother to Chicago.

"[Historically, the] day [may have] emerged from a custom of mother worship in ancient Greece, which kept a festival to Cybele, a great mother of Greek gods. This festival was held around the Vernal Equinox around Asia Minor and eventually in Rome itself from the Ides of March (15 March) to 18 March.

The ancient Romans also had another holiday, Matronalia, that was dedicated to Juno, though mothers were usually given gifts on this day.

In Europe and the UK there were several long standing traditions where a specific Sunday was set aside to honor motherhood and mothers such as Mothering Sunday. Mothering Sunday celebrations are part of the liturgical calendar in several Christian denominations, including Anglicans, and in the Catholic calendar is marked as Laetare Sunday, the fourth Sunday in Lent to honour the Virgin Mary and your "mother" church (the main church of the area). Historians think that children who served in houses were given a day off at that date so they could visit their family. The children would pick wild flowers along the way to place them on the church or to gift them to their mothers.

---

As the US holiday was adopted by other countries and cultures, the date was changed to fit already existing celebrations honouring motherhood, like Mothering Sunday in the UK or the Orthodox celebration of Jesus in the temple in Greece. In some countries it was changed to dates that were significant to the majoritary religion, like the Virgin Mary day in Catholic countries, or the birthday of the daughter of prophet Muhammad in Islamic countries. Other countries changed it to historical dates, like Bolivia using the date of a certain battle where women participated."  Wikipedia

My garden has gone and gifted me with some lovely flowers. The freesias and little white hyacinths have started to bloom with all their loveliness and fragrance.




In the "secret garden" (so named because it's in a little spot all shielded from view- it's also where the satellite dish lives...) the bluebells and dark red hyacinths are also blooming.

I was going to write a post about something entirely different until I went outside and became intoxicated with the clean new smell of spring.  Just so you know, the air is fresh and mild and the sun is shining and it's just lovely here today.  It makes one feel all poetic and distracted with life's little problems, at least for the moment!

All in all there must be something in the spring air - some combination of chemical fragrances - that trigger a response in our psyches that spring is here and everything is renewed.

That or maybe it's just the bluebells...

Happy Mother's Day to all my U.K. friends as well.  Bless you all for being such great mothers!

~~~