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'Rememberancetide'
No, really, someone has coined this term and the otherwise sensible Royal British Legion has adopted it.
This year, for the first year probably since I started school, I failed to buy a poppy. I'd been fully intending to buy one for the past couple of weeks, but hadn't been anywhere selling them in order to do so [M&S don't sell them, haven't been doing any other shopping for various reasons]. I considered placing a safety pin on my coat in a strategic position to make it look like I'd simply lost my poppy rather than hadn't got round to getting one - [I normally get through two or three each November 'cos they fall out/get horribly creased], but didn't in the end. I was feeling rather guilty about this [in the context of it being a self-imposed obligation, not something someone else is demanding I do] and went and did one better by donating some money to the British Legion online. This has the added benefit that I was able to Gift Aid my donation (which you can't effectively do when putting money in a collecting box) so I'm feeling rather less guilty now. I think not putting money in collecting tins may become a personal policy on these grounds [with the exception of the Poppy Appeal each year, when I will put as little as I can legitimately get away with and then donate more online]
Apparently, it's not poor etiquette to wear a poppy all year round. I think that etiquette is wrong. I think:
*if poppies are worn too often the message/impact of Armistice Day/Rememberance Sunday gets lost
*if you have a personal anniversary/other specific reason for wanting to wear a poppy outside of the first couple of weeks of November then it's fine [because this will apply to small numbers of people + the overall message won't be diluted]
*it's poor etiquette for politicians and newsreaders to lord it over the rest of us by starting to wear them in mid-October. No one should be wearing one 'routinely' until two weeks before Armistice Day (or Rememberance Sunday if it comes first).
*it's poor etiquette/disrespectful to wear a creased or badly torn poppy, so throw away any worn poppies after Armistice Day/Rememberance Sunday.
This year, for the first year probably since I started school, I failed to buy a poppy. I'd been fully intending to buy one for the past couple of weeks, but hadn't been anywhere selling them in order to do so [M&S don't sell them, haven't been doing any other shopping for various reasons]. I considered placing a safety pin on my coat in a strategic position to make it look like I'd simply lost my poppy rather than hadn't got round to getting one - [I normally get through two or three each November 'cos they fall out/get horribly creased], but didn't in the end. I was feeling rather guilty about this [in the context of it being a self-imposed obligation, not something someone else is demanding I do] and went and did one better by donating some money to the British Legion online. This has the added benefit that I was able to Gift Aid my donation (which you can't effectively do when putting money in a collecting box) so I'm feeling rather less guilty now. I think not putting money in collecting tins may become a personal policy on these grounds [with the exception of the Poppy Appeal each year, when I will put as little as I can legitimately get away with and then donate more online]
Apparently, it's not poor etiquette to wear a poppy all year round. I think that etiquette is wrong. I think:
*if poppies are worn too often the message/impact of Armistice Day/Rememberance Sunday gets lost
*if you have a personal anniversary/other specific reason for wanting to wear a poppy outside of the first couple of weeks of November then it's fine [because this will apply to small numbers of people + the overall message won't be diluted]
*it's poor etiquette for politicians and newsreaders to lord it over the rest of us by starting to wear them in mid-October. No one should be wearing one 'routinely' until two weeks before Armistice Day (or Rememberance Sunday if it comes first).
*it's poor etiquette/disrespectful to wear a creased or badly torn poppy, so throw away any worn poppies after Armistice Day/Rememberance Sunday.