Someone was knocking urgently on the window of Brad Hermann’s car, shouting at him to wake up.

Hermann, 42, opened his eyes. He looked down at his legs pinned inside his crushed 2012 Hyundai Sonata. He felt an intense pain around his pelvis.

He could hear sirens blaring. Loud machinery that sounded like a chainsaw.

Fire trucks, ambulances and police cars swarmed the area.

“It felt like I was in a war zone,” said Hermann. As soon as he realized he was alone in the car, he started yelling out his wife’s phone number.

“Call my wife!” he begged.

He had been driving to pick up his 9-year-old son, Lucas, from a summer camp about a mile away. He was driving through a busy intersection when a cement truck T-boned the driver's side of his car.

His family’s life changed at that moment.

Hermann has no memory of the impact. Trapped in his demolished car and unsure if his legs could move, he panicked about his son waiting to be picked up from camp.

He kept pleading with first responders to call his wife.

His wife, Amanda, had invited a couple of friends over to swim at their pool when she got the call from an EMT.

“Your husband has been involved in a serious car accident,” he said. They were taking him to Mercy Hospital, where Amanda works as a registered dietitian. Hermann needed to be rushed into surgery.

Their neighbor left to pick up Lucas, and a friend drove Amanda to the hospital. She called his parents and her parents. The route to the hospital passed by the site of the accident, where Amanda caught a glimpse of their car -- the roof peeled off by the Jaws of Life to extract her husband.

She had to look away.

During the ambulance ride, Hermann kept repeating her phone number.

“We will call your wife,” an EMT reassured him. “We promise. We have to save your life first,” she said. The last thing he remembers is hearing an officer talking to Amanda on the phone.

His bladder was torn apart. His pelvis was broken in three places. Spleen crushed. Left shoulder and 10 ribs broken. He was in the ICU for 11 days in June while doctors performed several surgeries.

He was on a ventilator for five days. When he started waking up, he went through a phase of delirium. He was able to move from the ICU to a regular hospital room, and eventually, to in-patient rehab.

He came home on July 18 -- 34 days after the accident. His wife has been helping care for him around the clock.

“We’re not really toward the end of this roller coaster,” Amanda said. “There’s lots of ups, downs, sharp turns, good moments and bad moments.”

Hermann still suffers from extreme nerve pain and blood clots in his leg. Some days it hurts to breathe. He can’t use his left leg yet, and has an external metal fixation device holding his broken pelvis in place. He will have to learn to walk again -- after running the Big Sur marathon earlier this year.

“I’ve cried myself to sleep several times at night,” he said. But he refuses to stay in those low moments, wondering why this happened to him. Not many people survive getting run over by a cement truck.

“God saved me for a reason,” he said. “It’s my job to figure out what that reason is.”

He said he believes part of it may be showing his children and others what it looks like to come back after getting knocked down so hard: “I want to show my children that life can deal you a bad hand, and you can only control how you respond to it.”

He connected with the firefighter who kept him calm and helped rescue him from the car. Hermann sent him an email, thanking him. He has also thanked the neighbors, co-workers, church members, friends and relatives who have rallied around his family to support them since the accident. He talks about how his wife’s devotion to his care has taught him what love and commitment in marriage look like.

He knows it will be a long time before he can coach his kids' sports again. He hasn’t been able to swim or play catch with them, but they have been watching the Olympics together. He and his daughter, Layla, 12, have cheered for swimmers, pole vaulters, beach volleyball players and track and field athletes.

Perhaps one of the most inspiring comebacks has been that of legendary gymnast Simone Biles, who has won 11 Olympic medals -- more than any other U.S. gymnast. She had withdrawn from most of her events at the Tokyo Olympics in 2021 after suffering from the "twisties" and mental stress.

Biles fought back -- against doubters and haters and her own fears.

Each time she stands on the podium now, she embodies the same message Hermann wants to send: that no matter how hard the fall, you can rise again.

Kimberly Carpenter received a complimentary text recently from a dear friend.

“Congratulations on running the whole country. Good for you guys!” her friend wrote.

She was referring to Republican vice-presidential nominee J.D. Vance’s disparaging comments about “childless cat ladies” taking over the country. Carpenter, who works in insurance operations in St. Louis, is childless and a proud cat owner. Her immediate response was to laugh at Vance’s idiotic commentary, but she also found it deeply hurtful.

CNN reported that Vance has a long history of offensive commentary about people without children. He’s called Democratic leaders “childless sociopaths” who “don’t have a direct stake in this country.” While running for senator in 2021, his campaign sent fundraising emails referring to the “radical childless leaders in this country.” This was after his appearance on “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” during which he said, “We are effectively run in this country via the Democrats, via our corporate oligarchs, by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.”

He has since tried to back off the comments, which have elicited the ire of millions of potential voters, including typically nonpolitical celebrities like Jennifer Aniston. In a recent interview with Megyn Kelly, he said he was referring to Democrats as “anti-family,” adding that he doesn’t have anything against cats.

Vance may not have anything against cats, but he has a serious problem with women. His worldview bases the value of a woman on her ability and desire to reproduce. Vance, who converted to Catholicism, may be appealing to a base that shares the ideology that women belong at home raising children -- but this extreme view is far removed from the reality and values of most people.

All of us know someone who is childless -- either by choice or circumstance. Women who struggle with infertility or those who have not met the right partners or those who want to dedicate their lives to careers and communities are no less valuable or worthy than any parent.

Carpenter says it’s outrageous to suggest she isn’t invested in the future or in other children’s lives because they are not her own.

“I care about what this world is like for all of them,” she said. Her sentiments were shared by several other childless women I spoke to about Vance’s comments.

Hollie Brubaker, a television producer, made an independent film about her family’s journey with infertility. She spent two years on medications trying to conceive. Eventually, she and her husband decided their lives were full and complete without raising their own children. They love their nieces and nephews, and Brubaker is the emergency contact for her best friend’s kids.

“I have children in my life, and I am helping support other people (as they) raise their children,” she said. Moreover, she realized that she contributes a lot to her community and society regardless of her ability to reproduce.

Tracy Bednarick-Humes, an educational administrator, said Vance’s remarks reflect the rising movement in the government controlling how and when women should reproduce, like the abortion bans in place in many states after the Supreme Court overturned the protections of Roe v. Wade.

The bigger issue is about how women should lead their lives and who should control their decisions.

Julie Bauman, who works in project management and runs an animal rescue program, points out that childless people pay taxes that contribute to public schools. She said she is insulted that she even has to justify her worth in the world in light of Vance’s appalling, repeated attacks on the childless. She also wonders if the insults he lobs at women also apply to the countless childless men -- like George Washington -- who have led this country.

Dana Watkins Mullins, who works as a massage therapist, is as deeply invested in her community and the world as any mother.

“I’m not breeding stock,” she said. “I do a lot in my community ... I think me not having kids is one of the least selfish things I could have done.”

Elaine Vydra, who works in digital marketing, agrees: “For me, the more selfish thing would be having a child to make other people happy.”

Vydra had read Vance’s book, "Hillbilly Elegy," years ago, and said she found parts of his story -- where he describes overcoming a difficult childhood -- interesting, and that she had empathy for his struggles. So it was even more disappointing that he would make such harsh judgments about childless women and show a complete lack of empathy for others’ circumstances.

Carpenter ended up responding to her friend’s text on behalf of all childless cat ladies: “I didn’t know our plans for world domination were going so well.”

The new Democratic presidential candidate arrived on the scene accompanied by a meme and music unfamiliar to many likely voters.

Vice President Kamala Harris, 59, straddles a thin line between young boomer and older Gen X. But it was Gen Z that crowned her "Brat” after British pop icon Charli XCX’s newest album.

For the generations who automatically think of a brat as a spoiled child, a number of news outlets offered explainers on the Gen Z connotations of the word. The Independent defined it as “an icon; an embrace of authenticity and confidence in oneself.”

The Brat meme flashed hot and bright on social media. It has likely already faded, given the fleeting half-life of a meme. Harris has undeniably energized the electorate, with her campaign raising more than $120 million since its launch.

But more than fuel for content creators and internet warriors, she’s given a shot of hope to the demographic of women closer to her age.

Electro-dance pop is meaningless to us. Give us the iconic, rebellious and raw female power of Joan Jett, 65, and Alanis Morissette, 50, currently on tour together.

Morissette, who has won seven Grammys and sold more than 75 million albums, put on a show at the Hollywood Casino Amphitheatre in Maryland Heights, Missouri, that flashed powerful feminist graphics on every screen.

“No country has achieved gender equality,” appeared on the screen while she belted the lyrics to “Hand in my Pocket.”

That message resonates differently when America has the chance to elect its first female president after Hillary Clinton, who won the popular vote, lost the Electoral College in 2016.

That was before the protections of Roe v. Wade fell, an era when our daughters still had the rights our mothers and grandmothers fought for.

Everything is different now.

Back in January, a friend offered me a ticket to see “Jagged Little Pill” with her. My brain miscalculated that as going to a Morissette concert, which I had never seen, rather than a Broadway musical. My husband informed me of my misunderstanding the morning of the show after he read a preview of the jukebox musical in the paper. I had time to course correct before I showed up among the well-heeled theater crowd in my distressed jeans.

When I learned that the Morissette tour was coming to St. Louis, it felt like kismet. I hadn’t thought much about her in decades, but we’re both in a milestone year as the country faces a crossroad -- an election that will define us for generations.

Maybe I needed to revisit her discography, a soundtrack from my college days. The breakout hit from the JLP album, "You Oughta Know," is a scornful, seething and vulnerable message to a former lover. Over the course of decades, many of her original listeners have settled into stable relationships. We may find that the drama from the outside world is louder and occupies a larger space than the personal minefields of our 20s and 30s.

The political has always been personal. But lately, it’s become so pervasive, angry and unsettling that it’s hard to escape. We’ve been riding an emotional roller coaster in a tumultuous election cycle unlike those many of us have ever witnessed.

It was another Alanis classic that captured the political moment for those of us in this cycle of life. "You Learn" is a compassionate reflection on dealing with the bad cards life deals you. Through living, loving, crying, losing and bleeding, you learn.

“Throw it down (The caution blocks you from the wind)

Hold it up (To the rays)

You wait and see when the smoke clears”

In the days right after President Joe Biden gave up the presidential nomination, we were all waiting for the smoke to clear. I could sense how radically the political energy had shifted in recent days.

The vibe at the concert -- an embrace of unapologetic and fearless women -- reflected a changing political mood.

I decided to test the waters by wearing a T-shirt I purchased days after the Supreme Court’s flagrantly political decision on presidential immunity. It’s a solid gray shirt with a quote by Justice Sonia Sotomayor written in a white font: “With fear for our democracy, I dissent.”

I wanted to make a subtle statement appreciable by news junkies and political nerds to see if anyone understood what I was trying to convey. How many people at a rock concert would take the time to read an entire sentence on a stranger’s shirt?

At least one did.

An exuberant blond woman in the row right in front of me, who danced through Jett’s rock anthems, made eye contact and pointed at my shirt. I pulled it down to straighten it, so she could read the words.

She smiled, nodded approvingly and raised her hand-horns in a rock 'n' roll salute. Message delivered -- Rock on, sister.

We’ve screamed, we’ve learned.