1961

It is the year Mattel introduces Barbie's
new boyfriend, Ken; the year a Soviet
cosmonaut is the first human to cross into
outer space. I know that proximity and 
closeness are not the same, and there 
should be no reason for my parents to think 
Harper Lee's receipt of the Pulitzer for To Kill 
a Mockingbird the same year I come into the world 
augurs well for their child's career. Princess 
Diana was born two months before me. That same 
July, Ernest Hemingway, who wrote For Whom 
the Bell Tolls and once tried to walk into 
a spinning propeller, took his own life 
in Idaho. In a magical universe, there are 
no accidents. We already know we don't get 
to live forever. And yet, there are as many
times we stick to the plan as there are when 
we improvise or defer action. The launch 
attempt for the first orbital mission 
was postponed because of cloudy conditions. 
But it finally happened a month later, in '62. 
After a steak-and-eggs breakfast, John Glenn 
climbed into the Friendship 7. From space, 
he reported dust storms and flashes of lightning; 
earth's atmosphere a bright blue band, glowing 
particles he could only describe as fireflies.