It’s National _______ Day!

If you really need an excuse to party, there are several choices every day you can choose from. However, if you declare today National Archery Day (and it is), if no one knows it… does it really matter? What’s the point?!

Of course, in America, today is Mother’s Day–important for little kids’ gifts, the most phone calls made, breakfast in bed–but ever since it was promoted back over a hundred years ago, it’s the flower industry that reminds us of it every year. The archery industry just doesn’t have as much of a marketing budget to overcome that advantage.

For example, National Bowling Day is August 16th this year. I remember I was organizing an event five years ago at a bowling alley and we didn’t know it was a holiday until we arrived. We just planned to bowl regardless. However, we got free t-shirts, and it was nice… but as encouragement to bowl more, it lacked a lot of oomph.

Arbor Day is even having a hard time getting any traction. There’s an entire foundation dedicated to remind people to plant trees. The last I heard about it was when I was in 2nd Grade and we planted a tree as a class… that was the 80’s. It was April 30th this year… which is probably part of the problem. You’re hitting the end of the school year, and you had Earth Day on April 22nd (just the week before), so to have another environmentally-based holiday is rather hard to get excited about.

Despite the rhetoric, every day is NOT Earth Day, because we only have so much give-a-damn in our lives. Unless your cause is the environment, the rest of us have things to do. We’ve got to go to work, and take care of the kids, and feed the pets, and binge watch that Netflix series. Even if you care deeply about the environment, what are you doing daily to save the Earth? Recycling? Maybe that’s enough, but you’re not going to think about it after a while, and maybe you’ll check your coffee is free-trade, but you won’t care as much about your frozen pizza. You can’t pay attention to everything all the time.

Which is why there are holidays in the first place; one day you can remember to do one thing to make things better. But people have to know about it in the first place. Cornelia de Lange Syndrome Awareness Day (today) only works if people have heard about it; maybe shift it to a… not-Mother’s Day date? BTW, it’s a genetic disease that affects kids different ways, reshaping bones, and causing mental disabilities. Important… but shouldn’t it be important enough to put on a different day?

So if you’re going to have a Miniature Golf Day, a Stamp Out Hunger Food Drive Day, or a National Moscato Day realize that the entire point is to advertise that fact, and make sure you get the word out. And maybe not have them on Mother’s Day, because otherwise, no one will hear about it. But I could be getting too crotchety about this. What do you think? Let me know in the comments below! Then since it’s National Buy My Book Day (it’s not), buy one of my books. But if you think that’s a silly holiday, go ahead and download one of my stories for free.