Software is like sheet music, and computers are the players and the instruments. Programmers write the sheet music; they're called developers, or devs. Operations staff are conductors.
Now, you know how conductors twitch their batons and give directions to various musicians and sections of musicians? That's a kind of dance. "devops" means talking to the devs and the operators and writing choreography for that dance, to be performed by another computer system. Then you watch the conductor's dance and make sure that the conductor is doing the right moves at the right time and the musicians are properly playing the symphony.
"You know how there are web sites, apps, and internet stuff? Those all work by computers and apps/programs talking with other computers and apps/programs. I make sure that some of those computers and programs keep working right and to make sure someone knows when they don't work right."
Interesting to see so many confused /parents/spouses/etc in this thread. Even though what we work on is highly abstract, my parents have a reasonable non technical interpretation. I would think its the norm that the people you closely care about, or care about you, know roughly what you do, if you have explained it well enough to them in a compelling way. I guess delivering meaningless value for some soulless corporate entity doesn't really spark joy, or is memorable at all.
