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Tooth fairy skeptic

What Are Your Dreams?
I stood, my arms raised high, tears in my eyes. Before the throne of God above, I have a strong and perfect plea…
In my early twenties… teens barely behind me… I remembered.
I just wanted to write books for other kids who were hurting, too.
Somehow a stranger gave me the money to stand there… in the midst of the largest publishing conference in California (it’s a story, let me tell ya).
And now, my heart pounding, my arms raised high…
Next to me stood the woman who’d just told me she believed in my dream to publish these books. Like—with a real publisher. The journalism student in me couldn’t even process it.
This woman was a literary agent I’d wanted to stalk for years. Also, my friend, Suzie, promised to kick my butt if I didn’t get over my nerves and talk to this woman.
I have a strong and perfect plea…
Suddenly my pounding heart was replaced with complete peace.
Even if this dream was just that—a dream—and even if everything fell flat—and even if it was just a coincidence that God used a stranger to pay every dime for me to be at this conference—I had a strong and perfect plea.
The measure of my success wasn’t the human standard I work for every day (although I will work, very very hard to make his name big). The measure of success was Jesus—my strong and perfect plea.
That was several years, several books, and several kids ago.
But I woke up this morning with dark circles under my eyes.
It’s been a stretch of a week. Most of it was spent typing in the dark, doing the marketing thing when the kids were in bed, and lying on the floor playing Barbies while the room was spinning thanks to a trial of a new antiseizure meds. (Just temporary side effects.)
I don’t know where you are today with your dreams. I do know God put them in your heart. Whatever you’re working on—however you’re reflecting how big his name is—I want you to know that in the end,
You have a strong and perfect plea.
Up until now I’ve hesitated to post much about this past year online; I thought it might seem like I was being a fragile flower.
But as the man in my life recently pointed out, this past year only proves to your publishing fam that you are more determined than ever to push through, finish what you start (can’t wait to tell you more about the new release written in the thick of this, for 2018!), and work harder than you ever have for the sake of what and whom you love.
Today I’m sharing just a little bit.
A couple of years ago after baby number two, my epilepsy came back.
I don’t know what caused it; after over ten years of being seizure free I started having odd new symptoms.
I won’t bore you with the details (because, really, many of you are dealing with much more earth-shattering experiences right now) except to say I learned you really do need the feeling in your right foot in order to brake the car–
And you really do need to stay away from any medication that has the word “weep” in the middle of it (not kidding, this stuff turned my non-pregnant self into a hormonal bundle of nastiness).
I’d like to think I’ve come to the other side of this experience with a new sense of humor–perhaps a bit darker than before–which I can’t wait to share with you in a new series of books about us (you and me–living like the Mombies we are).
So what about you? What’s making you feel like a mombie today? I could use some company with this whole dark sense of humor thing.
{In case you missed this photo that got 13,000 likes on Facebook–they’d just finished trying to scratch each other’s eyeballs out to obtain sole possession of the umbrella when I snapped this.
Dang it. They never let me get the true action shots. It’s like they’re trying to protect their public reputations already.}