The illusion was shattered, if it ever even existed. The illusion that my children should have of me as the perfect mother was gone. During breakfast at a restaurant last December, my mother chose to share with my children one of the more embarrassing stories of my childhood—no, wait, the most embarrassing story—over our eggs, ham and pancakes.
This moment conveys one event in a long line of humiliating things that have happened to me. I was about 12. Some of you may remember that McDonald's had come out with a contest to win a Big Mac T-shirt. To win the contest, you simply had to harness the courage to stride right up to the counter and sing the famous "Two All-Beef Patties" jingle under a certain time limit. That was it.