Seniors Program Chicago – Book Club – Call-In Only, Every Day Is A Gift
This program will take place over-the-phone.
Please direct all program inquiries and RSVPs to Melissa Wittenberg at T: (847) 510-2060 or melissa.wittenberg@chicagolighthouse.org.
CALL-IN INSTRUCTIONS: After you RSVP for any/all programs that you’d like to participate in, here’s how to call into each of the programs – we will use the same call-in number for all programs: To join any of the programs over-the-phone, dial 872-242-7995. It will then ask you to enter the Conference ID 737 107 407 followed by #. It will ask if you are the meeting organizer and since you are not, continue waiting and shortly after that you will be admitted into the program.
Most participants will use the free Talking Books player. The audio book player will be mailed to you at no cost, as well as all audio books. We can help you complete an application if you are not yet enrolled in the program. Please RSVP to Melissa in advance of the program at: (847) 510-2060.
We will discuss the memoir, Every Day Is a Gift by Tammy Duckworth, listening time, 8.5 hours. Book #DB103255 in TBBS catalog. RSVP at: (847) 510-2060. In Every Day Is a Gift, Tammy Duckworth takes readers through the amazing—and amazingly true—stories from her incomparable life. In November of 2004, an Iraqi RPG blew through the cockpit of Tammy Duckworth’s U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter. The explosion, which destroyed her legs and mangled her right arm, was a turning point in her life. But as Duckworth shows in Every Day Is a Gift, that moment was just one in a lifetime of extraordinary turns. The biracial daughter of an American father and a Thai-Chinese mother, Duckworth faced discrimination, poverty, and the horrors of war—all before the age of 16. As a child, she dodged bullets as her family fled war-torn Phnom Penh. As a teenager, she sold roses by the side of the road to save her family from hunger and homelessness in Hawaii. Through these experiences, she developed a fierce resilience that would prove invaluable in the years to come. Duckworth joined the Army, becoming one of a handful of female helicopter pilots at the start of Operation Iraqi Freedom. She served eight months in Iraq before an insurgent’s RPG shot down her helicopter, an attack that took her legs—and nearly took her life. She then spent thirteen months recovering at Walter Reed, learning to walk again on prosthetic legs and planning her return to the cockpit. But Duckworth found a new mission after meeting her state’s senators, Barack Obama and Dick Durbin. After winning two terms as a U.S. Representative, she won election to the U.S. Senate in 2016. And she and her husband Bryan fulfilled another dream when she gave birth to two daughters, becoming the first sitting senator to give birth. From childhood to motherhood and beyond, Every Day Is a Gift is the remarkable story of one of America’s most dedicated public servants.