Failure and I go back a long way. We first met when I was nineteen. And failure, I have learned, is a patient teacher. It returns at periodic intervals, like the proverbial bad penny, inviting us, challenging us to relate to it differently. This is what the Irish writer Samuel Beckett captured so perfectly when he wrote: "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better." I know this teacher intimately. What I could not have imagined when we first met was that my most...

After my first viewing of Groundhog Day, I have of late had the desire to watch it again. That opportunity came on my recent flight back from India, where it appeared among the options for the long journey home. Fifteen years later, I returned to it—familiar with the storyline, of course—but discovering far more meaning than before. For those who may not know or remember, Groundhog Day tells the story of a man who wakes up to the same set of events every single day. The day repeats endlessly...

It happened in the most ordinary of moments, on my drive home after grocery shopping at Patel’s, where I go for my Indian vegetables and spices. The store had been playing familiar Bollywood melodies, creating a little pocket of India in Morton Grove as shoppers filled their carts. I walked back to my car with that satisfaction you feel when you know your refrigerator and pantry will be well stocked for the days ahead, still humming a song that had floated into my ears while shopping. It was...