Day 75 - A Day for Everything

It was Valentine's Day on 14th Feb (obviously) and the whole world was agog with celebration. Newspapers, TV media, Flower shops, Gift shops, online shops and everyone else wanted a slice of this pie. Of course in addition to this were also the necessary 'evils' of organisations crying themselves hoarse that this is not our tradition, that we should not be celebrating this and that they would get any couples seen together on this day, married.

To find out what 'days' were coming up I did a quick search and realised that there is a day for Fathers, Mothers, In-Laws, Daughters, Friends, Bosses, Women and I'm sure many many more. It just takes one genius to come up with a day dedicated to someone and for the gifting and cards industry to popularise it and take it global. And then of course people or 'suckers' to like it, celebrate it and make a big thing out of it. Why do some people go all out to celebrate such 'days' while some others berate it and oppose it?

A strong faction of people are on the side that such 'days' are basically a consumerisation drive by large organisations to ensure that the people are buying some gifts or cards and running the industry. They claim that we really don't need such 'days' as we show our love everyday for the said people. A famous point is always made that we love our parents and siblings on a daily basis and hence don't really need a day to pronounce our love for them and definitely don't need cards, gifts and materialistic items to tell them that. BigB goes on record to say that he doesn't believe in stuff like Fathers Day and Mothers day because he loves them unconditionally and doesn't need a specific day to say that.

I beg to differ. I think we get caught up in our daily lives to such an extent that we usually forget to give credit to important people in our lives. Humans have a tendency of taking things for granted. Things that exist around us in perpetuity tend to be taken for granted by us. This includes friends, parents and siblings as well. We fight, shout, bicker and argue with them on a daily basis as part of our lives and assume that what we want they should do - in other words - we start expecting certain things and take them for granted. Very rarely do we tell them that we love them and that they matter to us. That under all the bickering and fighting is extreme love that we have for them.

As normal people we would probably not get an Oscar or a Grammy or a Filmfare award where we can pronounce our love for our family in front of millions of viewers. And that is why these 'days' are important. They remind us that in our daily lives we should take out some time to tell them that we love them and that they matter to us. While we get an opportunity to do that for our children and siblings on their birthday and our spouses on our anniversaries, it is the parents that we tend to leave out and in some cases our in-laws as well.

I am a firm believer in Father's and Mother's Day and that we need these days to tell them how much they matter to us.

On a lighter note, how about 'Maids Day'? :)