I’ve mentioned the 8-year-old’s struggle with a very rare bone disease here from time to time. Colleen’s battle began in 2015, but after two surgeries on her left leg, the last where they removed her tibia and replaced it with a donor bone, she’s cancer free. We hope forever, but she’ll be checked every year for the rest of her life. While she walks with a cane at home, at school, she’s still confined to a wheelchair for her safety.

Yesterday was a big day for our girl and our community. Her school honored her by making her the “mascot” for this year’s Relay For Life. They had a special recess where the entire school came out to play and hear about her journey. Everyone wore #TeamColleen T-shirts. The local paper, the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, plus THV11, all highlighted her struggle. Last night, she was honored, along with all the local cancer survivors, with a dinner, and the family took their turn walking in the relay.

If you’d like to see the short TV news clip of yesterday’s recess, here’s the link: Colleen’s Story.

And if you’d like to donate to the American Cancer Society’s Relay For Life, here’s that link: Relay For Life.

First, thank you Delilah and Delilah readers for receiving me on this blog.

I am not one to make resolutions.  Like so many, in the past, I firmly declared my goals in the first month of the year and promptly forgot them by the third month.  But this year a Facebook friend posed the question: How will you grow this year?  This question goes beyond resolutions, although I realize that part of the reasons people make resolutions is to inspire some personal growth.  But this question challenged me to think about how I will fundamentally change who I am so that I can be a better me.

I have been wrestling with this question because growth requires you to change, to leave things behind and let stuff go.  I don’t like change or letting things go (not old emails, old receipts, old manuscripts, old grudges).  It also requires you to be brave enough to accept your new strengths as well as the challenges and responsibilities those new strengths inspire, like a superhero whose presence invites villains.  You just know that if you become more patient, a slew of people are going to stand in line to try your nerves.  So, growth isn’t easy and trying to grow demands that you work at it consistently.

How will I grow in 2017?

As a writer, I have not always shown up to the page.  Being a mother, a teacher and a writer has been a balancing act that has not always resulted in every aspect of me getting a fair amount of time.  More often than not, the writer in me has gotten the shaft.  In this new year, I am going to commit to showing up to the page, writing something every day.  Ok, let’s be more realistic—five days out of seven.  (This is a good start as there were some weeks when I didn’t write at all.)  I feel best, when at the end of the day, I have created. So I will work to produce and create.  I will show up to the page!

I will also commit to stretching my reading and writing genres.  I love to read, but I tend to select the same types of stories to enjoy. (I am in love with the paranormal!) I will expand my reading to include new, varied genres.  Maybe a historical romance and definitely a thriller.  I am open to any suggestions people might have for good books to try.

As my reading expands, I am sure my writing will, too.  I commit to trying new genres of writing.  Actually, my short story “Vivify” in Delilah Devlin’s Sex Objects was the result of an earlier attempt to try a new genre.  I had never written erotica before, but I found in exploring my character Cecelia’s sexual re-awakening, that this is a genre that is fun and fulfilling to write within.

I’m sure I will have to let go of something although I don’t know what yet.  I know that it is true that you can’t do the same things and not get the same results.  Maybe I will have to learn to say “no” when people ask me to be on this committee or do that project for them.  Saying “no” will be hard. Maybe I will have to give up my slightly obsessive need to watch everything that comes on television.  Letting TV go will definitely be hard.  We will see what this effort toward growth will bring.  While I am not sure of the challenges that will come, one thing I am sure of is that by implementing these new practices into my life, I will grow as a writer.

How will you do to grow this year?  Let me know.

https://www.facebook.com/RaShell-Smith-Spears-Writer-1390560764495274/
https://www.Pinterest.com/writerlee

Cashmere S. Jackson

Check out Cashmere S. Jackson’s “Vivify” in Sex Objects!

Maybe you’re curious about the authors you “hang” with… We must lead these glamorous lives, right? Huh.

Here’s a rundown of a typical day for me.

6:00 — The alarm goes off and I toodle upstairs to relieve my daughter, Kelly, who slept on the couch with her phone alarm going off every two hours to wake her so she can check on my grandma who is still recovering from breaking her back, but who doesn’t think she needs help to the potty (she does!). I sit at the kitchen table and work on whatever portable, paper thing I printed to get a head start on today’s work.

7:30 — I dress grandma and help dad prepare breakfast. Afterwards, I do the dishes and then head to my office to get some work done.

8:30 — I prep my blog, review my emails, get dressed and straighten up.

9:15 — I walk across the road to my dd’s house for a cuppa in the quiet (no kids other than the 3-year-old). We love our time together, so it’s our time to gossip.

10:00 — I begin whatever editing/writing tasks I have planned for the day.

4:00 — I’m done with work. I head over to my dd’s, hang until dinner in the chaos with all her 4 kids. After dinner, we might watch a movie or catch up The Magicians or The Big Bang Theory.

8:00 — I head back home to answer more emails, maybe do some more editing, until my dd comes over at…

10:00 — to stay the night. (She does that 5 days a week, I have one night, and my aunt the other). We hang for an hour, gossiping, checking out celebrity gossip, looking at art or food pins on Pinterest.

And that’s a typical day. Not very glamorous. When my dd has appointments or games or whatever with the kids, I babysit. We take care of each other and the people we love.

And sometimes, we carve out adult time, something fun. Like last night. I organized an art night in my messy, cluttered art room with my mom, dd, and our friend Christi. We ate from cheese and veggie trays while we worked on projects — Christi painted votive candle glasses with alcohol inks; Kelly drew cartoons in her art journal; my mom worked on a watercolor painting; and I cut circles out of an Arizona Green Tea can to make earrings with and painted some dominoes.

Me, Christi and Kelly. Fluorescent lights aren’t very forgiving! LOL

Afterward, Christi, Kelly and I headed to a restaurant in town to drink daiquiris. When I came home later, I worked a little longer on decorating my dominoes…

Something mindless and relaxing, because this morning, I began the cycle again…

So, that’s my glamorous life. What do you do when you’re not writing/reading?

I almost didn’t post today, but I suffer from the “anal” gene and couldn’t stand the thought of missing my goal of posting new content every day here. So, I’m going to tell you some of what’s happening in my life, because I’m a real person, facing real issues. And maybe some of you can give me some advice or at least share your experiences.

This past week has been difficult for this family. My 96-year-old grandma suffered a fall and fractured vertebrae in her lower back. She spent a couple of days in the hospital in Little Rock for evaluation. The doctors decided against surgery, no doubt due to her age, and sent her into a rehab facility in our town.

She’s miserable. Her greatest fear is spending her last days in a rest home. The “rehab” center staff feel they are better equipped to provide her care, but they don’t take into account her mental well-being. She’s very lucid. Hates the food. Dislikes the staff. Misses my dad’s coffee. She’s depressed, and I fear she will give up, especially after the meeting with the care coordinator today who said her recovery will be long-term.

I’m the only person in this family pushing for home health care. Sure, it’s inconvenient, and maybe her physical therapy won’t be as good or often as needed, but my grandmother deserves to be where she wants to be. At home, surrounded by the people who love her, fed meals she’ll actually enjoy eating, and drinking my father’s very superior coffee. And yes, we’ll have to pitch in more, but isn’t that the way it’s supposed to work? If she never heals, and spends the rest of her days in bed or a wheelchair, why not have it be in a place that she’s familiar with?

Okay, so maybe I’m sharing a bit too much. But this really bothers me.

Add that to the surgery our 7-year-old cancer girl faces on Thursday, and you can guess that the last thing I’ve been doing this week is writing. Instead, I’m worrying. And I’m not a worrier. I have a perpetually, annoyingly sunny disposition (other than when I’m watching presidential debates—I groaned, snickered, and shouted at the screen last night), so me being down isn’t me.

So weigh in. What would you do? Have you faced these choices too? Or have you planned how you will handle them in the future?