“What did you want to be when you were little?” my daughter Monika once asked me.

“A saleswoman—a woman who sells in a store,” I replied (when adults asked me, this profession seemed attractive to me at the time, much to their chagrin).

“Didn’t you want to be a mom?” Monika commented on my answer with this question, and it really touched me.

Because that’s what I do every day. Monika sees me as her mom, the mom of her sisters, and also the mom of a whole swarm of children who call me “Mom.” It wasn’t like that from the beginning. When someone suggested to the children who first lived at the center that they should call me “Mommy,” it seemed strange to me. I didn’t want to. Firstly, I felt too young for 10-year-olds to call me that. Secondly, I knew that these children, in most cases, weren’t orphans; they had their own mothers. To this day, I find it hard to understand the indifference of these mothers—it seems as if they didn’t care about their children at all. Therefore, by their standards, I was a pretty good mom. Over time, I noticed they had trouble addressing me. Somehow to call me by name didn’t feel right, so what? When they spoke of me, they called me “our mother.” Eventually, I told them to call me “Mom,” and it came to them with incredible ease. I matured into being a mother, and that’s how I feel now—though, of course, and naturally, I feel a big difference in my relationship with my biological children and those from Barkot. Nevertheless, as relationships are, one doesn’t cancel out the other.

I also know that my current job, “Mom,” is the most demanding, but also the best job in the world.

Happy Mother’s Day to all Moms! (It is celebrated in Poland today.)