Not “Happy Mothers’ Day. Not “Happy Mothers Day.”
As Sissy Willis (Sisu) pointed out on Twitter this morning, Mother’s Day was deliberately established with the apostrophe firmly between the R and the S. It is to be celebrated one mother at a time. (Or as Anne Lamott would have it, bird by bird.)
This is a stunning vindication for the copy editors of the world. PUNCTUATION MATTERS. Not only is it a form of musical scoring or choreographic notation, telling your inner voice and your thought when to flow and where to pause; it is also a tiny lever moving worlds of meaning, a focusing device directing your attention precisely where it belongs.
On you, Mom. This one’s for you: my one mother, my fellow copy editor. I love and honor you — not just today.
~ amba/Annie
Ambiance 
Sissy Willis said,
May 10, 2009 at 11:42 am
A perfect gem of a one-of-a-kind Mother’s Day gift for your dear Mom. Some web site the other day suggested kids forget the flowers and write a poem to their mother. In your loving hands, prose is poetry.
Sissy Willis said,
May 10, 2009 at 11:43 am
And thanks for the lovely link! :-) I’m starting to get a good idea of what this twittering thing is all about.
amba12 said,
May 10, 2009 at 11:46 am
Yes, I would say you got it real quick! Sped ahead of some of us, in fact. :)
Sissy Willis said,
May 10, 2009 at 11:47 am
You’ve got me prose poeticizing: Like mother, like daughter, a pride of copycats?
PatHMV said,
May 10, 2009 at 7:51 pm
You couldn’t have told me this BEFORE I printed the card for my mother today?
(FYI, I was printing out a card, because I just ordered for her a small piece of furniture from our friend Sippican, and it won’t be in for about a month; I wanted to give her a picture to show what was on the way.)
Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers out there.
Annie, is there a Caretaker’s Day we can celebrate for you?
Joan of Argghh! said,
May 10, 2009 at 8:18 pm
Whew! Glad I got it right. I did halt between two options but decided that it was, as pointed out, a day for each mom, individually.
Learning Spanish has helped and hindered my grammar in a hundred ways.
amba12 said,
May 10, 2009 at 8:39 pm
Pat: Every day is caretaker’s day. :-}
amba12 said,
May 10, 2009 at 8:40 pm
Joan: I’ll bet in Spanish it’s “dia de los madres” (it takes so much longer to say things in Spanish!). But then, I’m inappropriately generalizing from “dia de los muertes.”