Mother's Day Madness: Are We Being Conned?
Sunday, March 26, 2017
Hello again. It's been a while since I last posted, which is something you're all probably used to by now so I won't offer a long-winded explanation and will just leave it at the fact college is taking over my life and there doesn't look to be any end in sight right now. Sitting at home this morning I came across this rather controversial and actually quite amusing article my sixteen year old self wrote for GCSE English last year, and with my lack of motivation to write coherent blog posts and the fact it's Mother's Day, I thought I'd share it with you, so enjoy! **Disclaimer at the bottom of the page**
As per usual, it's just dawned on you (and the entire village
apparently – Tesco’s is heaving by the time you get there) that it's Mother's
Day tomorrow. You rush round the shops, reach for the most extravagant card you
can find whilst remembering some of the soppy speeches from the more exorbitant ones too, pick up one of
the only wilting plants there is left and grab the cheapest chocolates you can
find. Then - after your chaotic ordeal - you proceed to the checkout and buy
the card, which you have now decided is far too tacky, and the wilting plant,
which you’ll be lucky to get home alive at this rate, out of 'love': only to be
honest I'd call that guilt. The guilty conscience that eats away at you, and
has been doing around Spring time every year for as long as you remember (The
date changes – sneakily – but the anxious ‘is it soon?’ feeling starts to emerge
in, let’s say, mid-February?) The guilt that you probably don't say 'I love
you' to your dearest Mother as much as you should, or the realisation that the
'the best mother anyone could ever wish for' has cooked your tea every night
this week and you haven't once offered to wash the dishes after.
Sounds familiar, doesn't it? Mother's Day; the day we all let
our contrite consciences get the better of us and try and disguise it with
overpriced flowers and a milk tray.
I don't buy it.
It appears I’m not the only one who thinks
this. Some loiter near the stands for a while, staring blankly at
the commercial exploitation in front of them, before with one last hesitant glance,
timidly tip toe away. Some scan the myriad of flowers from a distance, but
somehow the pungent pollen still manages to irritate their eyes and they rush
away rattling their trollies down the nearest isle. Some, however, avoid the
Mother's Day stand like the plague. Because it's just there isn't it, staring
them in the face, a reminder of reality, a fusillade of flowery emotion
reminding them of a mother-child relationship they never had or would rather
forget.
Don’t get me wrong, the opportunity to dedicate a whole day to
the woman who brought you into the world is a sublime idea, but does it really
mean anything? It’s seen as a chore, maybe even an inconvenience to some people.
Then there’s the advertisements. That perfect picture of Mother’s Day that’s
plastered onto posters and television screens and pretty much anywhere else
they can put it (I hear tube stations are now popular places for the guilt
trip). The stereotypical jovial family; with the parents who are still married,
the kids who by some miracle have enough cash to be able to shower their mother
in gifts, despite still being at school, and the argument free household where disputes
over the television remote are unheard of. Who are they trying to kid? Not even
Christmas can prevent some families from disagreements, so what makes anyone
think Mother’s Day will be any different?
Next time you complete your yearly obligation to repay your
mother for all she has done for you in gratitude and love (or… flowers
and chocolates and Prosecco), just bear in mind the fact that on Monday you’ll
go back to squabbling over who used the last of the milk and relying on mum for
your washing to be done while the multimillion pound companies are laughing all
the way to the bank.
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Quick Disclaimer: Although I believe the shops really do take the biscuit with some of the huge marketing stunts they pull for special occasions like this one, this article is in no way a reflection of how I feel about my own mum, I love her very much and I hope she knows that! The stimulus for this piece was the topic of "Mother's Day" itself, and one of the criteria for was to be lively and humourous, and apparently I didn't think I could do that in a positive, loving way so this quite sarcastically snooty drivel is what I came up with. It got full marks so it must've been alright.
HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY TO ALL THE MUMS OUT THERE, YOU'RE PRETTY AMAZING.
UNTIL NEXT TIME I MANAGE TO CRAWL OUT OF MY TOMB OF STRESSFUL COLLEGE CHAOS,
KEEP SMILING
LOVE, CHARLOTTE XXX
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