It was during a conversation with my son a couple years ago that I realized he had absolutely no idea what it was I did for a living.

“If I work really, really hard in school and get good grades, I can do what daddy does,” he said.

“Aw,” I thought, “I can’t wait to tell this to his dad.”

But the journalist in me had to ask the natural follow-up question to help drive home the mom in me’s point: “What will you do if you don’t work hard and don’t get good grades,” I asked.

“Then I’ll just do what you do,” he said innocently, not missing a beat.

The kid had me both stumped and at an unusual loss for words. Not that my husband’s work as a mental health therapist isn’t important, because it is, but I ran the newsroom of the community’s newspaper, for chrissakes, and my kid hadn’t a clue.

“What do I do at work,” I asked him.

My son shrugged.

“I dunno. Talk on the phone. Tell people what to do,” he said as he chewed his chicken. “Boring stuff.”

Boring?

I was about to launch into the million reasons why I loved my job, why it was anything but boring, but I stopped. This wasn’t something that could be chatted away. No, my son needed to see for himself what an important job his mother had.

So, I began my educational campaign with my kid: I regularly pointed out the editorials I wrote. I lugged him along to the candidate debates I organized. He saw me speak in front of audiences. He accompanied me on weekends when I chased breaking stories like fires and accidents.

When the newspaper decided to participate in the county’s largest Fourth of July parade a few years ago, I volunteered my kid to help pass out newspapers to the crowds that would line Main Street.

If you’ve never been part of a small-town Fourth of July parade, it’s like a patriotic, rolling cocktail party with marching band music and politicians. People shout out greetings, you wave to folks you know, and everyone smiles. It’s a lot of fun.

That first parade was on a sweltering Fourth of July, and my kid doesn’t do so well in the heat. But he rose to the occasion, hustling papers to the crowd, charming them into outstretched hands. He was a red-faced, sweaty, one-kid paper distribution system, having a good time, enjoying the crowd interaction and doing a great job despite the blazing sun.

I had never seen my son that way before. He was part kid, part comedian, part hustler; a vision of him as an adult flashed before my eyes. I instinctively knew that no matter his grades in school, he’d likely end up doing something he enjoyed and being successful at it, too. It was a revelation I’ll not soon forget.

Me?

I rode in a convertible with the air conditioning blasting — a tough job, I know, but someone had to do it. On my head danced a band of flashing red, white and blue stars mounted on springs; from my ears hung sparkling flags; and around my neck swung strings of patriotically decorated beads. I am sure I looked like a character from the Revolutionary War version of the “Rocky Horror Picture Show.”

That Fourth of July parade was the most memorable of my life. My boy did his mom so very, very proud.

Back at work, people chattered on about how hard my son worked giving out papers. “What a great kid he is,” they said. He even got a shout out at the management team meeting, and a photo of him handing out papers made the company newsletter and his memory box at home. I promised to bring him along to work the crowds the next year.

It was a stellar repeat performance, except my kid was a year older and a lot taller. At the end of that parade, I promised my kid’s services for this year’s event.

But there’s no parade for us this Fourth of July. My position was “eliminated” because of budget problems; I was one of a dozen people, mostly middle manager types, let go on April Fool’s Day.

If the newspaper is taking part in the parade this year, there will be someone else riding in the convertible. All I will say about it is that I am certain they won’t look anywhere near as patriotically, star-spangedly goofy as I did. And they won’t have my secret-weapon son along to hand out papers.

The kids in my son’s community education karate class were invited to march in the parade, though. My son asked if he could do it, and I told him he could only if his dad took him. I was sitting out this year’s parade.

“I know it’s petty,” I said, “but it would be hard for me to go, like a bad memory.”

Frankly, my petty self doesn’t want to see who takes my place in the convertible.

 “That’s OK,” said the wisest 9-year-old kid in the world. “The parade won’t be the same without you there.”

Little did he know that these words and my memory of him working the parade crowds will last me through all the July Fourths of my life, like the flashes of fireworks that have faded from the sky but live on when you squeeze your eyes shut.

Our annual backyard fireworks show, 2008.