The first slide in my school-visit presentation lists a number of things I am in addition to being an author, and one of them is “son.”

“Usually,” I told an audience of second- and third-graders last Friday at Holiday Heights Elementary, “you have to take my word for it.”

But not that day. Friday marked the first time that my mom has ever seen me do a school presentation. She’s a former teacher herself, and she was the guest of a Holiday Heights third-grade teacher whose own mother taught with my mom in Lubbock in the 1960s.

(I’ve known that third-grade teacher practically since she was born, which seemed to make quite an impression on the students at Holiday Heights.)

The presentation went as smoothly as you could hope a presentation would go when you’d like your parents to see how much you love what you do. The 200 or so kids were attentive and enthusiastic — a great bunch.

At lunch afterwards the principal told my mom, “Thank you for sharing your son with us,” which pretty much made my day. And which, I suspect, may have had a similar effect on Mom.