“There are only two ways to live your life: as though nothing is a miracle, or as though everything is a miracle.”

~ Albert Einstein

As the story goes, I was a miracle.

On October 12, 1953, I was born prematurely. Delivered by cesarean section and weighing in at less than three pounds, I wasn’t expected to survive the night. My dad called my sister Margie from the hospital to let her know that she had a baby sister, but they hadn’t given her a name yet, because they didn’t think she would live. (I’ve been trying to unpack that no-name thing for years.) It was Columbus Day, there was no school, and she and my two brothers were watching the World Series. She hung up the phone, told my brothers about my arrival, went into her room, got down on her knees, and prayed for me to make it.

Back at the hospital I was in an incubator, fighting for every breath, and it didn’t look good. The doctor who delivered me said to my dad, A good doctor doesn’t mind a second opinion, and so off they went to find one. As it turned out, one of his colleagues, a pediatrician, was on call at the hospital that night, and as they stood around my incubator, he mentioned a new experimental drug that might be of help, but it wasn’t on the market yet. Also as it turned out, the hospital had one sample bottle of the drug, a detergent mist developed to help little underdeveloped lungs clear of fluid. The mist from that one sample bottle filled my incubator, and my lungs emptied out. 

The next day they gave me a name.

I like to think that I had a miracle with my name on it, but then I think you do too. Life is so fragile that it is miraculous to make it from one minute to the next. As I blow out the birthday candles on this my 65th birthday, my wish is that you know that there is a miracle with your name on it, and that miracle is you.