The Po Show

Labor Day

I think of two things when I think of the word "labor:" giving birth and unions.

Our Labor Day had nothing to do with either. We had croissants at Claude's (my husband is so nice; he let me eat the last almond croissant they had), played in Washington Square park, walked to Chinatown and had pho, walked back through Soho. It is rather laborious to walk anywhere with my children, especially since they've had their tootsies ranging free in flip flops all summer and were NOT happy to have them confined in shoes again.

We came home, the kids played Mario Party 8 on the Wii with Ross, Matthew had a major meltdown then recovered, and I worked on preparing Matthew's old fall/winter clothes for ebay.

Yesterday we went to the Met Museum, which went very well considering the kids have a fairly low tolerance for art museums. Tessa actually got into the modern art section, and they both really like the Egyptian section and the armor. We stopped at the Cloisters on the way back. Saturday we went on a garden walk at a nice county park and went shopping for a new bike for Matthew. That afternoon/early evening Ross and I watched our beloved UCLA Bruins win their season opener.

All of this added up to a nice long holiday weekend, but I still don't know what it all has to do with labor. Why do we have Labor Day? Why do we celebrate the work that builds the nation by not working? Was it really all just constructed as an ideological challenge to May Day? I just don't get it.

For me, Labor Day has always been the last hurrah of summer, the day that marks the end of vacation and the beginning of the new school year. That's still true for my kids (they start school on Thursday), though these days it seems like most kids across the country start school in August. What's up with that? You can't even count on Labor Day signaling the end of summer vacation anymore!