Are we even related?

Sometimes I wonder about my mom. She seems to have no concept of fashion or what I do. When her friends ask about me, she says I’m off ‘finding myself in the city’. When I come home on the holidays, she’s always insisting I do something else with my life.

“Sweety, when are you going to get a job?” She’ll ask with a concerned look.

I always reply with the same comment, “Mom, I have a job.”

“I know, I know… modeling, right? I mean, when are you going to get a real job, or at least a husband that can take care of you?

I try not to get annoyed with her because she means well. She just has no concept that modeling is a career, and that I indeed have a job. Thankfully, dad helped with the initial contract signing – otherwise, I probably would have needed to wait until I was 18 to do anything in my career.

It is sometimes frustrating to even speak with her; talking about work is completely useless. One time, when I told her about a shoot I landed with a photographer I have been after for nearly two years, she had this dumbfounded look on her face.

“I don’t understand, sweety; couldn’t you just schedule to take pictures with him?”

It’s hard not to smile at someone so clueless.

But, in a way, I kind of like the fact that my mom knows nothing about the modeling industry. It makes home a sort of safe zone; some place I always know I can go, and let my hair down. When I’m home, I’m not just another model; I’m the most important girl in the world – her daughter.

But I am guilty of at least trying to catch her up to speed. One time, just for fun, I put my fashion know-how to the test. Anxious to do anything to get out of the house, I took her to the local mall to update her wardrobe. It went from fun mother-daughter time to a stressful wardrobe consultation.

There I was handing her outfits through a dressing room door while my mother insisted there was no way she looked good in anything I handed her. We finally agreed on an outfit, something predictably similar to everything else she owns and left before I started to lose my patience.

It’s moments like these that completely verify my suspicion that I got my fashion sense from my father. At least she cooks well.