squirrels in her backyard. In contrast to that, though, he also describes the way she grew up poor and even refers to her as "the kind of Dominican girl who was destined never to get off the mountain or out of the campo" (Diaz). 

He then recounts the way his grandmother expected his mother to work on the family's farm indefinitely unless, of course, she got married. When caring for the field hands, though, his mother realized that she wanted to become a nurse. However, she had no education and her mother did not support the idea of her obtaining one. 

That said, a few months later, Trujillo, the country's dictator at the time, mandated that all children under 15 be educated. If parents didn't obey the law, they could face imprisonment, but Diaz's grandmother didn't seem to care. So, in a last ditch effort, Diaz's mother drank water from a puddle in order to make herself sick.

Her family was planning on moving further up into the hills for seasonal work and eventually they decided they weren't going to wait for her to get better, so they left without her. As soon as her family left, Diaz's mother ran to the schoolhouse and reported her own mother. At one point, the grandmother tried to take the girl out of school and back into the hills but the police put her in handcuffs and Diaz's mother remained free to get her education. 

Diaz ends the essay informing the readers that his mother was never actually able to become a nurse because they immigrated to the United States and she was never able to learn English, despite trying very hard.

However, he then states that he currently works as a professional writer and attributes all of his success to her. He says he believes that, "who I am as an artist, everything that I've ever written, was possible because a seven-year-old girl up in the hills of Azua knelt before a puddle, found courage in herself and drank" (Diaz).

He goes on to conclude the essay, saying that he thinks of his mother's courage whenever he needs inspiration or faces hardship in his art.