Celebrating Mother’s Day; My Mother, My Childhood Fulcrum!

Isaac Nunoo

“A mother who is not everything for her children: a friend, a teacher, a confidant, a source of joy and founded pride, inducement and soothing, reconcillator, judge and forgiver, that mother obviously chose the wrong job.”— Paul Joseph Goebbels

When I first saw this quotation on the Internet, I was taken aback and began to ask myself whether we indeed have such women on earth to be credited as such. Then, my mother's name struck me like a thunder piercing through my very anatomy.

I grew up knowing my mother as the mother and father of the house. A woman sacrificing her all to see to the upkeep of the children, especially me. One time when I came back from secondary school, I received so many complaints from our neighbours about my mother's nocturnal activities of late that I became so worried and cried. The complainants did not understand my mother but I understood her very well.

What was the problem? My mother's petty work was seasonal, she swung among several petty jobs depending on the season. It happened that in one of the dry seasons, there was virtually no favourable petty job for her to do so she cleverly resorted to selling tomatoes. Now she had to wake up at dawn to journey to the farm to beat competition. From the farm she went straight to the market and came back in the evening. She was doing all this to be able to pay my fees and settle other expenses in the home. Indeed, there are women and there are mothers.

My mother gave me her only portable silvers she was using for cooking when I secured my first job after a relative I consider a sister had refused to spare me some silvers even though she had excess. So, I left with those silvers leaving her with virtually nothing to cook in. What a mother!

As I looked around my neighbourhood, something interesting caught my attention. I could count more than ten women with children without their fathers either because they (the fathers) were dead or had just deserted those families. In effect, many homes in my area and I believe, many other places in Ghana could best be described as families of determined, hardworking, and selfless women and their humble children.

Motherhood, from my mother's experience is a multifaceted responsibility divinely occasioned by the Maker.

I cannot imagine the number of hours my wife spent attending to our children as a nursing mother. I must confess they were enormous. She denied herself the pleasure of participating in so many interesting events just to be there for the kids. Kudos to all mothers!

Women's Day Celebration, the History
The second Sunday of every in May has been set aside for the celebration of Mother's Day by many countries. It is a day set aside to appreciate and honour mothers for their immense contribution to the upbringing of children and procreation in general. It is traditionally characterised by the presentation of flowers, cards and other gifts to deserving mothers.

The celebration of motherhood can be traced back to the Greeks and Romans, who held festivals in appreciation of the mother goddesses Rhea and Cybele. In the United Kingdom, a similar festival dubbed “Mothering Sunday” was celebrated mostly by the Christians.” This celebration which was once a chief tradition in the UK and some parts of Europe fell on Sunday. It was seen as a time for children to honour their mothers by presenting them with flowers and other tokens of gratitude. However, over time, this custom eventually became unpopular before amalgamating with the American Mother's Day which had become very popular in the 1930s and 1940s.

The celebration of Mother's Day started in America in the 19th century. It was championed by Ann Reeves Jarvis of West Virginia. She started a movement known as the “Mothers' Day Work Clubs” which was used as a platform to teach local women how to properly care for their children, especially during the Civil War (1861-65). Jarvis organized “Mothers' Friendship Day,” in 1868. On that day, mothers gathered with former Union and Confederate soldiers to promote reconciliation.

Julia Ward Howe was regarded as another originator of Mother's Day celebration. In 1870 she wrote the “Mother's Day Proclamation,” which enjoined all mothers to unite in promoting world peace. Then, in 873 Howe canvassed for a “Mother's Peace Day” to be celebrated every June 2.

It was in the 1900s that the campaign for an official Mother's Day holiday began. This was started by Anna Jarvis, daughter of Ann Reeves Jarvis. She thought of the day as a special occasion to honour her own mother (who had passed on in 1905) and all mothers in general. After gaining financial support from a Philadelphia merchantman, John Wanamaker, in May 1908 she organized the first official Mother's Day celebration at a Methodist church in Grafton, West Virginia.

By 1912 many states, towns and churches had adopted Mother's Day as an annual holiday, and Jarvis had established the Mother's Day International Association to help put pressure on the US government to make the day a holiday. Her perseverance paid off in 1914 when President Woodrow Wilson signed a measure officially establishing the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day.

Anna Jarvis's version of the day involved wearing a white carnation as a badge and visiting one's mother or attending church services. By the time of her death in 1948 Jarvis had disowned the holiday altogether, and even actively persuaded the government to see it expunged from the American calendar because it had been abused by companies and individuals she called Mother's Day profiteers.

The Western style of celebrating Mother's Day has been greatly replicated in Africa with South Africa taking the lead. However, it should be noted that before the celebration of the day gained popularity in the West, Africans were already showing much appreciation to parents for their enormous contribution to the upbringing of the children in communities. The old African adage that says that “if your parents take care of you to grow teeth, you too should take care of them till they lose all their teeth,” reinforces this claim.

The day should equally be seen as a moment for those not performing their divine assignment as mothers to change their attitude towards their wards and do so. Have trust and confidence in your own children and you must endeavour to know and understand your children better. It is a big shame when a mother is told by another person be it a brother or a sister which of her children is/are evil. Unfortunately, those who claim to know other person's children better would do anything to support and make their children happy. What is good for the goose is good for the gander (too).

To all true MOTHERS, I say AYEKOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!