The Postscript: Summer birthdays

It was my birthday this week.

Those of you with summer birthdays know it’s a little different. In the middle of March, everyone says, “Wow! A birthday party!” You bring treats to school and everyone is happy for an excuse to celebrate.

It’s different for the summer kids. Everyone is already busy with vacations and visitors and then, somewhere in the middle of all that, someone says, “Oh! It’s Carrie’s birthday, isn’t it?”

My birthday was particularly unreliable because it fell when the plant where my father worked as an engineer shut down and he always took that time of...