May Day!

No, no I'm not calling for help.  It's the first of May, known as May Day.  Time to dance around the maypole.  Time to plant some spring flowers.  If you live in a socialist-leaning society (or state of mind) you can honor the working class.  In Ecuador people get the day off work (if it falls on a work day, of course) and people jokingly refer to it as The Day of Bums, since they all get to relax and be "bums" for a day.

It is also Loyalty Day, Save the Rhino Day, and Mother Goose Day.  Whew!  What a busy day.  No time to be a bum after all.

If you want to call for help with this term (if you need to be saved from a rhino, for example), you must repeat the term mayday three times.  Otherwise you will be ignored and it will be assumed you are dancing around the maypole.  The term is from the French venez m'aider which loosely translates to get your ass over here and stop that rhino from charging me immediately.   Isn't French a beautiful language?    So eloquent.

May is an eloquent word in English.  I love the sound of it.  I think of Lilies of the Valley when I think of May.  Mother's Day.  A woman's name.  Birthdays of my daughter, my sister, and my mother.  The end of the school year, the beginning of summer, the month that the pool opens!   Take three bunny hops.  Mother-May-I?  Yes, you may!  Peonies and lilacs.  Rhubarb.  Kids baseball.  It's a great word, a great month, and so very polite.