With apologies to my mother.

When I was in primary school my mum was my biggest source of shame. As far as I was concerned she wasn't a proper mother. As far as I was concerned you should not be able to pick your mother from the family assorted selection ranged along the front fence of the school at 3:00pm. You should not be able to see your mother from space.

Proper mothers, I would have told you if you'd asked me, should have long, flowing hair in one of the acceptable artificial colours (ash, autumn, savannah sunrise), long, flowing skirts in a feminine floral design, lipstick colour-coordinated with their high heels, high heels colour-coordinated with their handbags and a keyring displaying the logo of their secondhand (Dad, of course, gets the new car) but well-maintained hatchback dangling from their manicured fingernails.

I could almost have forgiven Mum for having to walk us home had she not had short, brown hair, covered in winter by a red woolly hat, a backpack, absolutely no makeup (not even plucked eyebrows, for God's sake) Masseur sandals and a purple and red jumper with blue corduroy trousers with an apple patch on the knee. Who told me I was naked? I don't know, but they should have had a look at Mum before they had a go at me. All I wanted was to be collected by somebody who fitted in. I spent the next five years at my friend's house trying to get her mum to braid my hair and teach me how to shave my legs.

Saturday afternoon at my parents' place the door opened to reveal a woman in green, brown and cream striped corduroy trousers, brown boots with one grey and one hot pink sock poking out of the tops of them and a khaki jacket. No make-up, of course, and no earrings either, with hair that hadn't so much been dragged through a bush as put through a mulcher. I had to be shown in a mirror that one side of it had collapsed, the time between traffic light changes not being what it once was. My mother, of course, looked gorgeous - just a hint of blush and lipstick and a very smart suede jacket...and heels. Some people know when it's worth making an effort.

My mother will live to shove me around in my Zimmerframe because she started walking before it became fashionable to walk and get nowhere. The patch on the trousers took me overseas for the first time and bought me a clarinet. She's never had to unclog her pores because she never jammed them up with grout in the first place. She once grew her hair and looked like a drowning sheepdog. Just like I look with long hair, in fact.

Some of us, one in particular, are happy not to give a toss what anyone else thinks; and some of us, me in particular, know that all the things I ran away from are actually all the reasons she's fantastic.