CHICAGO — Every once in a while, serendipity knocks at your door. For Dr. Emeline Ramos, that knock came not once, but twice.

“First I was hired as a pediatrician at IWS Family Health, a clinic in the same community that I grew up in,” she said. “I thought that was pretty remarkable.”

The second knock, perhaps was even more serendipitous than the first.

“I was told during my orientation that the clinic would be taking pictures of us for the new ad campaign debuting on CTA buses across the city,” she said. “I couldn’t believe it. I told them my dad was going to flip because he drove a CTA bus for over 30 years.”

As soon as the ads came out, the pediatrician plotted a big surprise for her father.


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“I was able to arrange for him to go back to the old CTA bus garage,” she said.

Ramos said her father drove all those years so his three daughters would have access to higher education and all the opportunities he never did.

“I am who I am because of my parents and my dad. I got to where I was able to get because of my dad. My success is his success,” Ramos said.

Seeing the posters plastered all over the buses, brought her father Antonio Ramos to tears.

“I was shocked when I saw the picture. I thought, ‘Oh my God, that’s my daughter’,” Antonio Ramos said. “It was all very emotional for our whole family.”

Life’s funny like that. Never knowing how sweet it will all look one day from the rear-view mirror.

“Here I am, a Puerto Rican girl from Humboldt Park whose dad drives a CTA bus and she made it!” Emeline Ramos said. “I can’t think of a sweeter way to say, ‘Hey Dad, we did it.’”

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