I was nine years old when a tick bit me on my family's farm near Yosemite, California.

I remember it clearly — a big bullseye rash spreading out from the bite. We didn't even find the tick itself until it had already been lodged there for at least a couple of days; my father finally pulled it out with his own tweezers. But this was a different era of awareness. We had no idea what Lyme disease even was, let alone that antibiotics given quickly could have changed everything that followed. So nothing was done. Life simply continued.

I want to tell you about the moment, years later, that made me understand exactly what that farm afternoon had actually cost me — because I think it's the moment so many of you reading this are living right now without realizing it.