Forcibly pried out of my pre-natal nirvana during the coldest and bleakest month of a Chicago winter in 1976, I spent much of my childhood in a karmic balance between my wonderful, doting, family and the meanest, pettiest, rudest buncha Catholics that have ever assembled to run a “school” on the Northwest Side. Since that time, I have garnered knowledge and skills that have proved themselves to be of some economic value and worth in society.
So that worked out. Among these knowledge and skills I count: speaking in complete sentences, acid and base stoichiometry, driving a car like a calm, rational, actor, HTML and CSS, some Spanish, Fluent Polish, and treating people as though they are individuals worthy of patience and dignity.
I have the world’s best husband and dogs. I don’t eat animals. Public education is the most important thing in the world to me. I love science, art, and history. I only miss believing in an after-life when I realize it means I will never get to ice skate on the rings of Saturn. Otherwise, I’m happy I’m here and I worry a lot about what we can do to make everyone feel the same.
Average Chicago temperature in February of 1976 was 35.8 degrees. January and December of 1976 both had an average of 20.0 degrees – so how can February be the coldest month of the year?
Tom H. –You have posed a fair question and my only response to you is that my memory of this event was hazy due to my neonatal status.