Inspire: Look to your Mother

I hope you all had a great May Day weekend!  Did you catch any door knockers and kiss them? 

This weekend is Mother's Day.  This holiday is when we typically thank our mothers for all the hard work they put forth in raising us.  But it didn't start out that way.  Mother's Day in the US was a day for women to gather for peace.  Julia Ward Howe wrote a Mother's Day Proclamation that I believe all women, mothers or otherwise, should read.

I love this part:

Say firmly:
"We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."

 In these confusing times, it is good that we have a time of year to evaluate our relationships with our parents and parental figures.  All too often we overlook the good our parents do because we expect it.  We could have been raised differently, for good or ill, and maybe we don't like our parents.  But there are still women out there who have given us birth, not only our physical bodies, but to our spirit, our creativity, and our minds.
What did you learn from your mother?  How will you celebrate?