My origins are the start of a Tom Petty song: I grew up in an Indiana town. (Though my loving mama was definitely around.) I luxuriated in falling asleep to a chorus of frogs and crickets in the summer.
As a girl, I didn’t expect that I’d end up living in Chicago as an adult and loving it. I didn’t expect I’d be able to bike city streets daily without sacrificing life and limb. But after many years of living here, I’m still alive (it helps that I cooperate with traffic), and I can’t imagine living anywhere else. Chicago is a place of tragedies and failures in potential, yes, but it is equally a place of beauty, grace and inspiring grit.
I stumbled into journalism after college. I started at a community newspaper and eventually wound up on the copy desk of the Times of northwest Indiana. That was my gateway to the Tribune.
Working at the Tribune, first on the metro copy desk and then as a member of the opinion team, has been a world-class education. Not just because of my very smart, very funny and unique colleagues. But because of the readers, too.