My first job in high school wasn’t scooping ice cream or tearing movie-theater tickets. Instead, I spent a summer working at the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City, where my mother, a Foreign Service officer with the State Department, was stationed. I was assigned to the “visa barn”—aptly nicknamed because of the building’s shape, and its chaotic interior with rows of benches for applicants to wait.

In the Barn, I Realized Just How Lucky I Am