I would bet that every woman reading TriangleMom2Mom has a different definition of herself as a Mom. Some are lax. Some are strict. Some are organized. Some are chaotic. Some are strong disciplinarians. Some just go with the flow. Some yell. Some whisper. Some threaten. Most love and nurture. Of all my friends who are Moms (basically all of my friends, it seems), no two are the same.

On a completely unrelated note, some people ask me how I got into writing and why I feel compelled to write about everything. As for my writing skill, if you think it’s good, then credit my Mom. If you think it’s bad, well…never mind, I can’t say that in a G-rated post.

In order to conflate being a writer and a mother I would like to present you with one of my early writings about motherhood. (Conflate is a new word I learned this week in a letter to the editor. I was so excited about it that I blogged about it.) It just might clear up any confusion you have about how you define yourself as a Mom.

I was in third grade when I wrote it, so that would have made me about eight years old. Things were pretty controlled in those days. You stayed between the lines. (I actually got my only C in my life in hand-writing that year. This piece was written during the semester following the C, when I got an A.) They told you what to write about. You did it, the teacher graded it, you took it home and if your Mom was a good Mom like mine, she put it in a booklet with a pocket for work from each year of school so you could leaf through it almost 40 years later and muse about what you were thinking back then, what it was like, how much you remember and how much you’ve forgotten.

[Ed. note: After 50 years my Mom has my Dad trained to wash dishes, but seriously, I don’t remember my father ever washing dishes back in those days. It might have been my first effort at artistic license!]

After reading it, do you see? Isn’t it simple? It’s really all about the high heels!

Starting this week, Di appears on Wednesdays on TriangleMom2Mom. (It switched from Saturdays). Read more about Di at her blog Live and Let Di.