You wait frantically for that letter, the letter of acceptance from the National High School Institute. That letter defines what you will do for the summer, and possibly your future.

One day you get back from school and it’s finally here. You’ve been accepted into the NHSI for the summer.

Hoo-ray!

But wait a second. It just happens that your birthday falls during the time that you’re at Northwestern. You’re not going to spend your birthday like the past decade and a half, at an overcrowded pizza parlor filled with snot nosed little kids being forced to sing “Happy Birthday.”

Oh no!

Hold on, don’t call up program director Roger Boye and tell him you won’t go.  Having your birthday fall while you’re at Northwestern is a good thing.

It will be different, I can almost guarantee you that.

Take me for example. My birthday falls on July 26. In 2008, that fell on the last Saturday of being at Northwestern of NHSI.

Normally I’d spend my birthday with my family keeping with Mexican tradition, making and eating some special food, usually tamales or pozole. I’d kill for some of that stuff right about now, but that’s beside the point.

At 11:59 p.m., the day before my birthday, Ellery Kauvar, one of my fellow cherubs, was staring at the clock waiting to turn. Once it struck 12:00 a.m. he jumped up and screamed.

“Happy birthday, Alberto!” he said.

He and Mike Schneider, yet another cherub, had bought me two books. Both of them knew that I was into a bit of the heavier music. One was a hard bound book of a list of all known metal bands, appropriately titled “All Known Metal Bands.” The other was a heavy metal activity and coloring book.

Aw, how sweet, right?

The next day, I was walking in front of a clothing store when I see Mitch Steinfeld, a cherub from Los Angeles. He saw me and told me to come inside. Then and there, he bought me a black fedora. If you’re going to be a journalism cherub, that’s what you need, a fedora.

Later that day, I went to the movies to go watch “The Dark Knight,” but it was sold out. Instead, I went to see the Will Ferrell and John C. Reilley film “Step Brothers.”

At night after check-in, almost all the cherubs gathered in the Great Room to celebrate that I had made it through one more year.  

If your birthday falls on a day that you’re at the NHSI, feel good about it. Cherubs are great people to party with.