Go buy a commemorative mattress or something...

My mother celebrated every single holiday that popped up on the calendar, which accounts for the fact that I never really noticed such a thing as “the winter blues” until I was grown. February, March and April in those days was chock full of minor holidays, from Groundhog Day on and every one of them received some sort of celebration, usually involving food (you knew that was coming).

My mother was the diva of food coloring come February, conjuring pink cakes and green cakes (you had to use your imagination for the green cake, which was actually gray and unappetizing, but we were, if nothing, supportive). There were hot cross buns on Ash Wednesday and St. Joseph’s cake (the lone store-bought cake of the genre) on St. Joseph’s feast day. There was even a tradition that, when you went job hunting and you got a job, you had to bring home a cheesecake to signal that you were now employed. I suspect my mother made that one up…

There were small observances at school on these little holidays, usually a craft or something because we actually had an art teacher in our elementary school. The cafeteria would serve some weird dessert, vaguely connected to the day (the one I remember was brownies on Lincoln’s birthday – I guess because the brownie was brown and square like a log cabin?).

The reason I’m dragging you all down memory lane is that holidays around here usually do elicit feats of domestic derring-do. But since I’m not my mother, the minor ones have fallen by the wayside – perfectly in keeping with how they are treated throughout the rest of the country.

Honestly, I was never a fan of George Washington’s Birthday as holidays go – for a very specific reason. Usually the craft for the holiday was to make silhouettes of each other. No big deal? Yeah? It was for me. My silhouette looked exactly like that of the day’s honoree, a fact that never ever went unnoticed.

So you will have to forgive me if I didn’t jump out of bed this morning and immediately bake a cherry pie, to commemorate something that never happened, but a strong-surviving myth nevertheless. Honestly, not many around here like cherries all that much.

Except Dirtman (you knew that was coming too).

So, in honor of George Washington, a cherry Pop Tart will be consumed by Dirtman at lunchtime today.

Me? I’m spending the day trying to not cast a shadow.