What to Wear on Mothering Sunday

Over the years I have worn some strange things on Mothering Sunday.  For example, a necklace made of wooden beads from a car seat cover, interspersed with gold plastic buttons and threaded on a long orange bootlace.  Many mothers on Tyneside wore a similar necklace on Mothering Sunday, 1995.  I doubt many of us have worn them since.

My sons are now 20 and 18, and have observed their father closely over the years and learnt that flowers, cards, and special meals are what mothers really like (even though Mum swore blind at the time that the car seat necklace was the most beautiful piece of jewellery in the world and she would keep it forever).  This means that I am free to choose my own outfit and accessories on Mothering Sunday these days.

So: what to wear on Mothering Sunday?  Well, help is on hand from the liturgical calendar if you move in cathedral circles.  Mothering Sunday is also Laetare Sunday, or Refreshment Sunday, the Sunday midway through Lent on which we traditionally lighten our penitential burden.  Lenten purple is softened to rose.  This is only in more rarefied high church circles, you understand.  The kind of place where you have to suck boiled sweets during the mass so your ears don't pop.  I looked on Google images at rose vestments, and there plenty of gorgeous examples, any one of which I'd gladly use to upholster a small ottoman in my new deanery.

Obviously, I am too lay and too low to be prancing about in rose vestments, but I did wear pink.  Pink socks with brown mid-heeled shoes.  I've seen young people doing the sock and heeled shoe thing, so I think we're OK with this, aren't we?  I also had on my high-waisted wide leg 70s style jeans (hence the need for heels), a pink vest top and a pistachio V-necked sweater, the one that so nearly got taken to the charity shop before I knew pastels were big this season.  Over this I wore my big pink cardy-coat.  I spotted several other people in pink in Lichfield cathedral today.  Possibly just coincidence, but it did look rather nice.  Clashed hideously with the little bunches of daffodils that were given out, mind you.

WEEK 14--First Ever Karate Grading

Result!!!

'Are you nervous?' this was something I was asked a lot in the run-up to the grading last Sunday Morning. Answer: 'Not really.' I hesitate to say it was a piece of pish, partly because that would be vulgar, but mostly because I have no doubt that steps could be taken to ensure future gradings are hellish if I make light of the experience.

But the truth is, after judo gradings on the 1st Dan mat (i.e. people fighting for their black belt) last Sunday held few terrors. The only ghastly moment was when I asked how much it would cost and was told £80--which I believed. (£25 in fact.) To use an analogy from the world of dentistry, if novice level karate gradings are a scale and polish, judo gradings are root canal fillings. And at black belt level, they are root canal fillings when the dentist is John Geilgud off The Marathon Man.

For a start, last Sunday's examination was done within the club by our own coach. It was held in a small private room at the Leisure Centre. (Rather than in a hall the size of an aircraft hanger reeking of testosterone and populated by psychotic teenagers and blokes with half their teeth missing.) Our sensei (coach) held a brief training session before the grading to refresh us on our various waza (techniques), then we were away. For those of you interested in such things, (basically, my Mum), I came away with a level 2 pass. There are 3 pass levels, with 1 being 'teacher's pet' and 3 being 'could do better'. I gather it gets a lot harder as you progress through the grades, culminating in a 3hr exam for 1st Dan. They speak of passing out from terror and exhaustion, of bleeding toes and other things the Geneva Convention was supposed to put a stop to.

But that's a long way off, and at this point, I would gladly spend another Mothering Sunday in this manner. Our new belts were awarded yesterday night at the training session. I was warned not to wash it with my kit. Hah! I knew that already! Martial arts laundry-waza is obviously a transferable skill.