Why My Mother Sent Me to School in a Wet, Wrinkled Uniform (On Purpose)

Instead of coddling me, she endured judgment to teach accountability

When I was 13, my mother called me into the laundry room.

“I’m going to show you how to iron your school uniform,” she said.

All public school kids in Mexico wore uniforms, and up to that point, I had never questioned where mine came from—somehow it was magically clean and pressed every Monday and Wednesday morning.

She walked me through the process—metho…