Birthdays. When we are young, a child, we can’t wait until that next birthday comes. The day after we have one we start counting down the days until our next one, just like Christmas. However, when we get older, typically after 21, birthdays just become another day where we turn older. They don’t mean as much. Well, two days ago it was my birthday. It was one of those significant ones. I turned 40. I was holding onto my thirty’s as long as I could. In fact, here is a little funny story. … [Read more...]
Day 104: Writing Your Own Front Yard
Think about this for a moment. When we write or talk about things do we use our past experiences during those times or do we just guess and hope what we say make sense to others. Personally, I think the best comes from the things we have personally experienced. For example, how could someone write about loss and how it feels if they have never been through any kind of loss. There are different types of loss. Losing a job. Losing a pet. Losing a friend or even just the friendship itself. … [Read more...]
Day 96: The Things We Keep
In life as each day goes by we create memories. For the most part most of those memories aren't that important so we forget about them. But the important ones sometimes feel like they embed themselves into our brains. When my daughter died I knew I couldn't go back and live in the house where all I had surrounding me were memories of her. Pictures on the wall. Her silly cups. Her food. Her bedroom. I was a stay at home mom of a child with severe autism whose life completely revolved around my … [Read more...]
Day 89: Worries of Writing Memoir
I want, no, I need to share this excerpt from the book I'm using. Even as I sit here writing this, I feel my eyes moistening. I hope you will see why this has touched my heart and maybe why God lead me to the very book to use in my 365 day journey. "Robin Romm worried whether to publish the memoir she had written about the last three weeks of her mother’s life. She wrote thirty pages of notes during those weeks, then ninety pages in the ten days after her mother died. Romm felt there were … [Read more...]
Day 84: How to Be a Writer
There's an age-old saying that says "patience is a virtue." However, God skipped the boat with me on that front. Sometimes I can feel the frustration boiling up to where my lid could blow a hole through the roof. I know my voice can suddenly shoot up to screaming in a second. This has been a flaw of mine since I can remember. Through all of this, God decided in His infinite wisdom that I could handle a blond hair, Caribbean blue-eyed beautiful little girl who happened to have severe classic … [Read more...]
U is for Unconditional
Mari showed everyone every day what true unconditional love really looked like. How much do we wish we could love someone unconditionally. I think the closest someone could truly love someone else this way is the parent/child relationship. When it came to Mari I loved her with all my heart. No matter how hard or difficult things could get I loved her. Sometimes in those moments of frustration you say things you don't mean. That is when the emotional roller coaster is leading the charge. If … [Read more...]
T is for Time
Mari's time may not have been long on this earth but the impression she made on those around her will last forever. When we think about a young child dying, the first thought that naturally comes to mind is they're too young too dye or they're time was too short or they aren't supposed to die before me. We are human and in our brains we can't wrap it around how not just a child, but any child for that matter, could die. Our hearts break any time we hear of one passing. Mari was no … [Read more...]
P is for patient
Because Mari taught me how to be patient. I always tell people that God has given some people the gift of patience, but I'm not one of them. Since I can remember I've struggled with being patient. I guess using the cliché, "She has a short fuse," can be pretty accurate most of the time. The thing is having a daughter with autism doesn't exactly mesh with someone who doesn't have patience. So who do you think is going to have to change? The person with autism whom you can't communicate with … [Read more...]
Day 72: Writer’s Remorse
To write truthfully sometimes we have to write things we may not want others to know but are important to be true to who we are as a writer. When I think about this it kind nails me to the wall. My past isn't pretty. And it's not from anything bad I've done personally, but instead what has been done to me as a child. I think of my mom and every thing she went through as a child. My Granny and Grandpa partly raised me as a child. However, how they were with me was completely different than … [Read more...]
L is for Loving
Because loving Mari was, and still is, so easy to do. When you are pregnant with your first child everyone tells you that the moment your baby is born you will be filled with so much love that there are no words to describe the amount of love that fills your heart to capacity to the point of even spilling over. You question how can that possibly happen. There are no answers that can describe it. It just does. I remember shopping in Wal-Mart one day with my mother-in-law and she told me … [Read more...]
