Sometimes I imagine I’d meet a stranger, and he or she would say “So tell me about yourself” like people normally do. To make things interesting, I imagine telling them some random personal things like the following.

     I was born after eight months of pregnancy. I wasn’t premature. I didn’t need incubation or anything, but I was one month short of the norm. My mother said her mother told her babies delivered in the eighth month mostly come out as stillborn. That she shouldn’t tell people about it. It would bring unwanted attention to me as a rare survival. I grew up not wanting attention, even before I heard this story. I am not superstitious, but maybe. Just maybe. Not wanting attention is a survival skill wired in me. Or it is just...

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