My Mary Tyler Moore Life

I originally started this blog to chronicle my hard road to becoming the confident woman I am now.  It has occurred to me that I have been influenced by so many avenues in my life.  I found all episodes of “The Dick Van Dyke” show on Netflix; and, with each viewing, I am transported back to a more innocent, hopeful time when JFK headed up the Camelot years.  With the world in such unstable times now, I revel in the basic goodness of that show.

I adored Mary Tyler Moore.  She was adorable, funny, talented, independent, and most of all, she reminded me so much of my mother.  People used to tell my mother that she looked like Mary Tyler Moore because my mother was also adorable, funny, thin, dark-haired, and she rocked those tight black pants with black patent leather flats.  I still tell people that my mother is a cross between Mary Tyler Moore and Jackie Kennedy.

I know that part of my strength as a woman came from what my mother signified to me as a child.  Whenever she came to pick me up from school for a doctor’s appointment, she wowed the main office staff with her style and beauty.  When she walked into my classroom, you could hear audible sighs from my classmates.  My teachers thought she was my older sister at first glance.  Unlike many mothers today, my mother wouldn’t be caught dead showing up at my school in a T-shirt, pajama bottoms and slippers.  My mother was a working woman who never left the house without her pencil skirt, short jacket, nylons, high heels and coiffed hair.  I beamed with pride when my mother presented herself in public.  Even on the weekends, my mother wore slacks, a cute top and stylish shoes.  As a divorced woman (not of her choice) who kept down a full-time job and the tireless task of mothering, my mother modeled that a woman could do it all…and still look fantastic.

In my next blog, I will delve deeper into how my mother’s creativity shaped who I am today.