On Friday I celebrate my 35th birthday. To mark the occasion today, I want to delve into some interesting trivia about where and when I come from. What follows is my origin story.
I was born at the Glendive Medical Center on November 5th, 1986 in Glendive, Montana to Byron Doyle Mullet, a native of Eastern Montana, and Alice Ann Mullet, maiden name Ranew, originally from Milton, Florida, near Pensacola in the panhandle of that state.
You will forgive me for not remembering, but the Weather Underground tells me the historic average for that day of the year is 36 degrees Fahrenheit, with the record high and low being 72 and -6 respectively.
The history of the naming of my hometown is that Sir George Gore, a wealthy Irish sportsman, named his favorite hunting area in 1855. "Gleanndubh" was at some point anglicized after a combination of two Irish words meaning 'valley' and 'black.'
Thus I come from a town named after "the black valley" nestled on both banks of the Yellowstone River on the outskirts of Makoshika State Park, said park named after the Lakota Sioux phrase meaning "bad land," or "bad spirits." The local high school sports mascot is the Red Devil.
Interestingly enough, my wife's maiden name is Duff, a Scottish name which my research has concluded comes from that same Gaelic word 'Dubh' which helped form the name of my hometown.
The day I was born being November 5th, the people of the United Kingdom across the waters celebrate every year as 'Guy Fawkes Day' to reflect on the famed and failed Gunpowder Plot, an attempt in 1605 to blow Parliament to retake the country for Roman Catholicism.
But the year I was born in being 1986, the United Nations designated the 'International Year of Peace.'
A decent number of famous movie stars, musicians, and athletes were born the same year as me. And now I am officially old enough to run for President of the United States. But what does all of this really mean or matter? Can anything be gleaned about who I am as an individual from pulling on all these diverse and eccentric threads?
"Vanity of vanities" the Preacher says in Ecclesiastes. "All is vanity." And while my rehearsing these factoids may be interesting in its way, it may also be chasing after wind.
Nevertheless, it is interesting to ponder. Where we are from, what family we are born into, when we reach certain stages of development and what is going on in the wider world when we do - all of these have some kind of bearing and influence, even if only God knows precisely to what extent and end.
