Rare card alert

 Today's alert is a card I sent myself and was just registered by the recipient in...Downers Grove, Illinois.  In over twelve years of Postcrossing during which I've sent over 11,600 postcards, this is the first card I've sent to the western Chicago suburb where I grew up.  Downers Grove is now a moderate sized Chicago suburb of over 50,000 residents, though it was much smaller when I lived there through the 1960s, 70s, and 80s.  The village (it's always been referred to as a "village", for some reason) was founded in 1832 by a settler named Pierce Downer.  It is located on a commuter rail line into Chicago, and so has become a prosperous bedroom community, and all-around basic, nondescript suburb.  My childhood there was pleasant and comfortable, if not exciting.  Downers Grove is not known for producing much of note, apart from Sherrill Milnes, the famous operatic singer, and Emo Phillips, a once-popular standup comedian.  My high school friend and soccer teammate once served as mayor of the village.  All these decades later, I still have happy, nostalgic memories of the place, which were revived by sending this postcard.

The postcard that was just registered in Downers Grove.