So, family, you like my columns?

I've written about my family members for well over two decades now and here's the deal: I've never felt the least bit guilty about it, although once my kids got older and I realized they were really and truly human beings in their own right, I stopped using their names.

Yes. I know. Very sensitive of me.

Also, I didn't want to contribute any more funds to the Perpetual Family Therapy Fund than I absolutely had to.

Still. I didn't stop writing about my five sons. Or my husband. Or brothers. Or parents, especially my mother, aka "the most colorful woman who ever walked the face of this planet in a pair of heels with man-made soles and genuine leather uppers."

(EXAMPLE. My grandma used to tell stories about how my mother could pump gas at my grandpa's filling station WHILE shampooing her hair and never miss a beat. I can only imagine that people from all four corners of Wyoming happily drove into town to watch a leggy cowgirl accomplish this awesome feat.)

Anyway.

Last week I wrote about how my mother suddenly wants me to wear a blinking light thing on my head for safety purposes when I exercise outside in the dark.

But before I turned the column in, I called and read it to her, which was a Big First.

My mother laughed. Politely.

"Are you not OK with this?" I asked, her polite little ha-ha-ha-ha-ha-has ringing in my ears.

Oh, she was OK with it, she said. Except, come on. She didn't call the blinking light thing "a blinking light thing." She called it a "reflector."

And that's true.

She totally called it a "reflector" AFTER she totally called it a "blinking light thing" first. I know because I was there.

Anyway. Whatever.

My mother and I were both interested in the fact that suddenly after ALL! THESE! YEARS! I have started to worry what my family thinks when I write about them. What's up with that?

"Maybe," my mother said, "you're scared that we're going to start writing stuff about YOU."

Which mostly makes me sad to think there are no stories floating around about me pumping gas while washing (and possibly conditioning) my hair.