Seattle Times Interview and Article on Blackout Babies

I never realized how far reaching this medium could be until I started writing this blog.  People have been contacting me from around the world.  Last week, closer to the home front, a reporter from the Seattle Times e-mailed me, wanting to interview me about a post I wrote about the Seattle Blackout Baby Boom (click here to read it). 

The reporter inquired about my sources, and I promised to see if anyone was willing to broadcast to Seattle the fact that they’d conceived their children during the blackout.  As luck would have it, my neighbor Felicia had an amazing story about her miracle baby, one that she was more than willing to share with the city.  Not only had she conceived her child during the blackout, but as a breast cancer survivor, she’d been told by her doctors that she couldn’t have any more children.  She was undergoing chemotherapy at the time she became pregnant.  Now, she has a beautiful and healthy, one month old baby girl named Aneesah. 

In the interview, I waxed philosophic about the reasons why people like to identify themselves with the blackout births.  People still recall the 1965 New York blackout and the births that took place nine months later.  I think that there’s a sense of belonging among those who identify as “blackout babies.”  Similar to people who proudly proclaim to have survived the 9/11 terrorist attacks in New York City or those who can remember choking on ash filled air near Mount Saint Helens,  these people are part of a special group that can uniquely connect with a historical event. 

The story ran on the front page of the Seattle Times today.  Felicia and her family have a wonderful picture.  I got a nice little quote at the end, which I’m choosing to believe is a place of honor.  Click here for the article. 

I’m humbled to realize the small role I played in this process, and how God guided a reporter to my little blog.  I catch myself spending time worrying about accomplishing my goals and getting enough readers, and then something like this happens to make me realize that it’s ultimately not in my hands at all.  Only God could put me and my blog on the front page of the Seattle Times.  I could never do that on my own strength. 

“I can do all things through him who strengthens me” (ESV Philippians 4:13).