Monday, Monday . . .

It all started with Emperor Constantine the Great, who in 321 AD, established the 7 day weekly calendar. Sunday was the day of rest. Monday started the world working again. And work was hard.

Henry Ford later enhanced the Monday monster myth in 1926 with his creation of the Monday through Friday 40 hour work week. The NYC legal profession bumped that hourly number to 60 (for slackers) and 80 (for future partners). I was never partner material.

But the anti-Monday indoctrination begins long before you cash that first paycheck.

One of the very first albums I owned as a youth was If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears by The Mamas & the Papas. 

My favorite song on that album was California Dreamin’

But my second favorite was the group’s song Monday, Monday.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h81Ojd3d2rY.

Now, the lyrics of that song, sung with amazing meloncholic harmony, are insidious when it comes to gently conditioning a maleable young mind to “not trust that day” and to be “crying all of the time” whenever Monday comes. Tá brón orm.

By then I was ten years old, in fifth grade (November baby) and well immersed in the Monday through Friday travails of St. Maggies Catholic grammar school’s intellectually and spiritually arduous educational week, readily reenforced with corporal punishment.

For this young BIC, Monday was idelibly marked with the sign of the beast (or was that me?!). Nothing good ever came from its arrival during my educational years.

But working brings the Monday message home.

Indeed, in 1988, shortly after I completed all of the advanced education I could endure and I was forever immersed in the legal profession, the International Organization for Standardization issued ISO 8601, which officially recognized Monday as the first day of the business week on a world wide basis. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO_8601

Monday’s curse had now spread across all borders like a pandemic.

Shortly after that, in ’92, The Cure confirmed my legal employment experience in the lyrics of their hit song, Friday I’m In Love.

Mondays were indeed black and blue and always fell apart.

In hindsight, it was never fair to Monday. The world was stacked against it from the start.

But yesterday, I had time to contemplate the unfairness of this weekly injustice while lying on my favorite chaise lounge, my trusty Beagle Brothers resting comfortably on top of me, listening to the wind chimes orchestra under The Old Man.

And as I futily tried to gaze around the constantly shifting mountains of heavy canine, I realized that perception all boiled down to perspective.

As my wonderful now passed guru, Dr. Wayne Dyer, often said,

https://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/wayne_dyer_384143

And yes, that line appears in The Claire Saga.

Well, given that I recently said goodbye to my legal life of unappreciated servitude, I took another hard look at the Monday conundrum, and had the Grinchian “fah hoo foraze, dah hoo doraze” epiphany that Monday did not deserve eternal damnation. Indeed, my once lawyer’s heart grew three sizes that day.

Monday deserved better.

So, from now on, the concept of Monday only shall be captured in the lyrics of the Imagine Dragon song about that wonderful day:

“You are my Monday, you’re the best day of the week
So underrated and a brand new start
Don’t care what all the kids say
You’ve got the key to my heart”

And I will not stop there.

It’s been my lifelong wrong of this innocent day. I’ve often cursed it by name in these blogs. I must publicly own this injustice. Time for some Fallen Catholic Penance.

I must therefore atone by impulsively and publicly engaging in that one creative form that most terrifies me – Poetry.

Monday Apologético

For decades, I have pushed past you, eyes averted,

wishing away that seventh of my life.

Hoping to ignore you from my existence.

But squandered time can never be reverted

and I can no longer blame you for my strife.

It’s time to resolve that unwarranted resistance.

So let’s move forward, this old man, converted.

Cut away that lifelong malaise with a knife.

And allow me to appreciate your true benevolence.

* * * * *

There. I stand before the world, or at least my fine, five readers, emotionally vulnerable in a virtual stockade.

You may hurl your rotten tomatoes at will.

But one thing I will not do this Monday morning.

I will not mentally gird myself for another professional workweek.

Instead, I will embrace this Monday morning with love and warmth, and let it lead me to a new, spontaneous and far more interesting life. All seven days a week.

But no matter what else we all may get up to, let us make this Monday great!