David Diego Rodríguez was conceived in Celaya, Guanajuato, México, and born in Perth Amboy, New Jersey, thereby earning his Mexican-American hyphen in utero. He was raised in Chicago’s Pilsen and Back of the Yards neighborhoods. He also lived in the Marquette Park neighborhood before moving to the Bridgeport and Beverly neighborhoods. His first language is Spanish but learned English the hard way, by starting the kindergarten speaking only Spanish. He struggled through elementary school and spent the worst two years of his life in the fourth grade. He eventually improved his English well enough, without losing his Spanish, to graduate from the eighth grade. After six years of high school, he dropped out when he earned his GED. He has worked many jobs since childhood: paper boy, sales at a produce stand, factory worker, Marines Corps, standup comedian, community theater actor, and university Spanish instructor. He takes great pride in having gone from GED to Ph.D. and graduating Phi Beta Kappa from the University of Illinois at Chicago. He has published in the CARA Finish Line and the Illinois Runner, among other local publications. He also has a blog at Wordpress.com. He also performed standup comedy on a local cable TV show.Read more about this authorRead less about this author