Wednesday, May 12, 2010

Better late than never...

Mother's Day is over now for another year (thank goodness!!) but, in case you haven't seen them already, I wanted to share some links with you for some really great articles I've found over the past few days:
  • Anne Lamott -- who is a mother -- expounds on "Why I hate Mother's Day" at Salon.com. Great subheading: "It celebrates the great lie about women: That those with children are more important than those without." (Thanks to Janis at Ferdinand's Gifts for pointing this one out!)
  • From Serene Jones, President of Union Theological Seminary at Huffington Post: "Worst Expectations: Motherhood Lost." Sample quote: "...the strength of a community rests as much in its capacity to grieve as it does in its capacity to celebrate."
  • Actress, mother by adoption (& my fellow Manitoban) Nia Vardalos counsels (via Anderson Cooper's 360 blog on CNN.com): "If you don't have anything nice to say on Mother's Day..." Sample quote: "A small social guideline: don’t ask a woman if she is pregnant, unless her water breaks on your flip-flops, a baby arm dangles out of her vagina and she asks you to cut the cord. Then, and only then, may you ask if she is having a baby. Otherwise, shut up."
  • And finally, a blog post responding to the comments on Pamela Tsigdinos's New York Times guest post, "A Non-Mother's Day." Next time someone asks why you don't "just adopt," have them read this -- I think it says it all.

8 comments:

  1. Oh, thank you so much for discovering and posting links to these articles. So, much of it echoed my own thoughts, or gave fodder for considering a perspective I hadn't encountered before. Again, thanks.

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  2. I had read the others, but not the Anne Lammott piece. I might have to post that on facebook...


    www.brandysheaif.blogspot.com

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  3. Thank you so much for posting these links.

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  4. I read Anne Lammott's essay, too, and thought it was excellent.

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  5. great articles, all of them! I definitely appreciate all the alternative viewpoints on this day. thanks for sharing!

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  6. This wonderful collection of writings made the mother's day season much easier to bare. And thank you so much for sharing the final link, I hadn't seen that very important post. I was so happy to see a response to the horrible comments that Pamela's wonderful post received.

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  7. As usual, you point me to some very interesting reads I would probably otherwise miss.

    I love the Anne Lamott piece. Even though I don't believe she experienced loss, she actually echos a lot of my feelings about the day.

    thank you, Loribeth

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