Dedication & Acknowledgements

This book is dedicated to my children,
whose mirror images allowed me to
break free, break down, and ultimately break open.













Acknowledgements

*I need to thank my husband, Michael, pretty much every day for the rest of my life; without his physical, emotional, and spiritual support, my dreams would have been swept away in a pile of dust, discarded without regard for hope. He is my human security blanket that allows for my childlike belief that anything is possible. Well, him and God.

*Thank you to every person who sacrificed the very precious time in their lives to read my last book, read my blog, and connects with me, one human being to another. Your support gives me my courage, my strength, each word of support has been a stepping stone for me to stand on, so I may continue my journey on solid ground.

*I need to extend a very special thank you to my family and friends for trusting me to write our mutual stories with a loving heart, good intent and careful thought. My greatest desire is to honor you the way you have honored me with your never ending love and patience.

*For my dogs, I want to say thank you for listening to my very bad karaoke when I get stressed. The fact that your undying loyalty makes you sit and tolerate my bellowing, listening ever so intently, following my every move, so I can unwind my addled brain, makes you my personal heroes. You continue to be the best audience I have ever had.










Fast Forward

Back when I first started writing, when fire was created, I sat next to the newly discovered wheel and I wrote so that I could unwind my life’s experience for myself. The idea was to put it all in print, these feelings, and these thoughts I was having, so I could then go back and read through them, making heads or tails out of what had just happened. Writing gave me perspective, time to think before I drew any conclusions from my life. Some of us are slow learners. Some of us need time, and distance to walk through the maze of our own brains. Some of us need to see it in writing.
This began my great love affair with words on paper. It was the singular moment in my life when all my pieces felt like they fell into place, no longer searching for corners, or odd bits to squeeze into the picture to complete the puzzle. It never occurred to me that one day I would be a writer. Having no degree in journalism, or literature, or even the want to write the next great novel, I wrote for no one, but me; or so I thought until a friend of mine read some of my work. She connected to the feelings the piece talked about. She said, much to my astonishment, “If I could write, this is what I would say.” It never occurred to me that I was not alone in my thinking. I never once considered the idea that someone else could take my words scratched on notebook pages and use them to describe themselves.
That became the first moment I felt the real sense of obligation to get it right, to be honest, open, dig as deep as I could, so I could help others speak, too.
I got letters from people who read my last book. I kept each and every one. They are as precious to me as jewelry, or antiques or my favorite photographs. The letters all said the same thing; they connected to me, to the book, to the words. Each spoke of a different chapter in the book, telling their own story to me in their own handwriting, how my story connected with theirs. Each letter, email, and note made me cry, big dripping tears of joy, empathy, sympathy, laughter, binding us together as one.
This book is built on essays. Little stories of how my life has intertwined with others. Evidently I have told stories my entire life, because just this year, as my mother cleaned out her house, she found my Kindergarten report card. The teacher had to fill out the back every six weeks telling my parents of my progress. While she never told them I was a genius in the making, never inferred they should get to me to a special school for the gifted and talented, what she did write was that I was a talker.
All day, every day, evidently, I told stories to the class. Each six weeks the card would come with exact same progress noted, “Kellie really likes telling the class stories.” Having heard that for the first time in my life, I laughed until I cried, thinking how diplomatic Mrs. Ford was. At least she didn’t call me a blabber mouth, ‘Chatty Cathy” or tell my parents to include a muzzle with my nap mat. My mom, said softly, ever so sweetly to me after I gained some composure, “See? You were a born story teller. It’s been there the entire time.” I gave my mom an air hug, you know like an air five, only cuddlier, because she was too far to reach.
I love my stories because they true, they help me to realize we are all more the same than different, and most of all they make me laugh, make me cry, make me feel just how lucky I am to be here, feeling anything at all. As much as I take my voice for granted, often getting sick and tired of hearing my own thoughts rattle around in my frequently chaotic head, I love the memories of my family, friends, even those horrible moments when I wished the ground would swallow me whole; those are the moments when I find out something so spectacular, so wondrous or horrifying, and I learn something, be it about them, or me or the situation.
Each story is a small building block that has brought me to where I am now. Every time I looked back on some situation, some particular event, I found myself learning something about myself, the people I have encountered and where I stood in the process of growth.
Learning, lifelong passionate discovery is my greatest love. It is in its singularity, the one thing I cannot live without. When my atrophying brain finally gives way, caves in and lets go, my time here on earth will be finished.
I want my intent of this book to be known, not to explain myself, exactly, but to let you know what my plan is. I want this book to be better than the last. My hope is the art of writing has improved, for sure, but more importantly, I want the content to be more.
The way, the only way I can see myself doing that much better, is to apply my husband’s skiing school practices here. Michael taught me to ski when I was 19 years old, in college and deeply in crush with him. I was having all these mushy, self-conscious feelings, the butterflies, the tinglies, and the “I refuse to look like an ass” feelings. I do get embarrassed. Back then I really got embarrassed. See, I thought, I would outgrow my dorkiness. I thought I would become the beautiful swan, butterfly, insert magical transformation here. I really did think one day when I grew up, I would be someone else. One day when I did grow up, I looked in the mirror to see exactly what I had seen a thousand times before and realized, yep, this was it. Tadah.
Anyway, Michael, a really cute, buff, college guy was teaching me how to ski. My dorkiness, my insecurities, all my bailiwick of crazy, came bubbling up in such a force I could barely stand on my skis. I have a fear of heights…That and breaking my neck; I am scared of that, too. I knew I looked like a complete ninny. I knew I was wearing more of the hill than the others had skied on. I was athletic, built sturdy, with formidable thighs and gams. I could not figure out the trick to getting my ass up on the skis. Michael showed such great patience, while laughing at my every move mind you. I felt my face burning red, with the sun shining; reflecting off the white of the snow covered hill, there was no way to hide my embarrassment. After spending much of the day on my back side, Michael said this, “Kel, you have to lean down the hill.”
“I can’t”, I protested, or whined depending on your perspective.
“Trust me; you do trust me, don’t you?” Michael gave me the charming, sexy looking up through his tousled hair thing. In my head I thought ‘Noooooooooo’, but out my mouth came a girlish giggle I could barely pull off, “Yeah, I trust you.”
“Lean down the hill. Put your weight on your downhill ski, and lean forward. You don’t want to catch an edge uphill. That’s what will make you fall.”
He was right, of course; leaning uphill while skiing will make you catch an edge on your skis, turning your legs in ways that rip apart your knees. It was terrifying leaning downhill, toward what I could only assume was my impending death. With each shaky turn, as wide as the mountain itself, I headed further and further down the hill, gaining speed, praying loudly as I went that I might survive dating an avid skier.
That is exactly what I feel about this book. I am leaning as hard as I can down the hill, gaining speed, turning tightly to avoid crashing into writer’s blocks, anxiety attacks and utter panic. I am digging my edges into the slippery slope, confident of nothing, but somehow hoping that at the end of this wild ride, you and I will be laughing as loud and as much, as Michael and I did, after I skied for the first time. I want us to be breathless, spent with explosive sounds of pure joy, yelling to each other, “Wow! Now that was one hell of a ride!”