And now...the rest of the story.
Yesterday I was talking about how I have a few (okay, a lot of) dorky habits, among them waiting each and every year for the US Census Bureau to release their “Annual Estimate of the Resident Population of Counties” survey. Aside from city managers and a few statistic geeks, I'm guessing not a lot of normal people look forward to it.
However, as we all know, I'm anything BUT normal.
So just how DID I turn out this way? Well, when I was young—too young to go to school—I would look at all the kids walking down the street going to class and, apparently, get bummed out. So every day I was like that my mom would read to me—read to me from the encyclopedia or the world atlas, so I could learn something even though I couldn't go to school. Those little lessons instilled in me a life-long love of geography (so much so that I minored in geography and population studies in college) and a burning desire to look forward each and every year to things like the US Census Bureau's “Annual Estimate of the Resident Population of Counties” survey.
Yup. I blame my parents.
I don't mean to sound like a typical Gen X-er, so maybe the word “blame” isn't the right word. It's thanks to my parents that I given the gift of learning, a gift that I still use today (hence, the huge stack of books about geography and history and language sitting on my kitchen floor, waiting to be read). I often claim to be a big dork (an absolute truth, by the way) but it's a claim that I proudly carry. And part of that is because of what my mom did for me all those years ago. I was four years old and couldn't go to school, so she made a school for me, a school that probably had as much influence on me as any other one I attended.
The reason I'm bringing all this up—aside from the fact that I dorked out on TV Monday night—is that it's the birthday today of my original school teacher, my mom. I highly doubt she set out to teach me; I'm sure, after all, that she just wanted to shut me up. But those little lessons I was given back before I could even understand what was happening have stuck with me ever since, and have been one of the biggest gifts anyone could ever be given--
The gift of learning.
So Mom—thanks for that gift, as well as all the others given to me over the years. I know a lot of people say that they have the best mother in the world, but no one will ever convince me that anyone else does.
Because I know I do.
Happy Birthday!!!!!
Love,
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