Mother's Day

Normally a holiday as innocent as this wouldn't find its way into my musings on war.

Normally, holidays don't exist just for the purpose of hallmark, and mother's day has a long history about being something else. Inevitably, this poem will be read in Unitarian churches and other places this morning, and inevitably, people will complain about the commercialization of this noble aim.

The divergent topics from this point are many and valid. Will more people take complaints about Mother's day more seriously than they took complaints about "Drinko" de Mayo? What good does it do to just remember the original purpose? Is the meaning there still valid? What's the significance of mother's day having its origins in 1870, with the Franco-Prussian war as a backdrop?

Really, what's valid and meaningful is said today by this. (If you're reading this on 5-20-2007 or later, the site will not be mother's-day-themed. This is probably too topical to work well anyways).

And then, as a last note, this and this. Both ends of the standard American political spectrum, tackling the problem of a new phenom in this day and age - single women mothers who are deployed in Iraq.