Stroke-versary : Lights in the Darkness

 Seven years ago I had a stroke.

I struggled to find myself as a writer again.
I couldn't string my words together the way I used to.
Couldn't focus.
Afraid of what might be coming next.
Worried it would happen again.

It's okay to acknowledge that darkness is scary.


To look fear in the face,
and then, look for light.

Because even in darkness, there is still light to be found,
maybe not blazing the way out, but still.
Look around!
We are surrounded by lights!

Health care workers and restaurant owners,
grocery clerks and custodians,
cleaning and feeding
and risking their lives to serve and heal and care for all of us.
Teachers and school staff setting up homework and food drop-offs,
authors sharing virtual story times,
museums, symphonies, theaters giving their art,
fashion designers sewing masks.


In a way, my book THE STARKEEPER was born out of my post-stroke darkness.
THE STARKEEPER is about a girl who wants to change the dark world around her,
and a lost star who needs the girl to help it shine.
And the way to shine it?
It's this.

Even in the darkest times, friends,
we still have one light to give.

And that light is whatever brave gifts that come out of each one of us.


Whatever your gifts are,
thank you for giving them,
thank you for lighting up the darkness.

Dear Author, Dear Year

It's a new year, windy and cold,
and here we are,
this complex, wonderful world of people.

My hope this year
is to keep searching for the glow in our daily dirt,
to coax out stories,
to make art that spreads welcoming arms across divides,
and to find ways to bloom courage and compassion into this world.


Tomorrow, our kids' Caldecott club meets.
We've nearly finished evaluating books,
and this week we get to write letters to authors and illustrators.
Several years ago, the wildebeests and I began a snail mail letter project,
attempting to write to as many children's book illustrators and authors possible.

I think we were aiming to write 100 letters.
Haven't quite gotten to one hundred letters.
Maybe thirty.
But I like to dream big. 
And regardless, we've received delightful responses!
 
Here is Pip with an original art card from Dana Sullivan,
author and illustrator of the Digger and Daisy books, and
Kay Kay's Alphabet Safari.
Thank you, Dana Sullivan!

Here's Winnie with a letter from Kim Baker, author of Pickle. 
Pickle happens to be one of Winnie's most favorite books ever,
so how outstanding to receive a handwritten letter and a shirt!
We have heart eyes all the way to the moon, Kim Baker.

We've heard from a bundle of lovely people - 

Margaret Bloom, Nina Laden, Grace Lin, Steve Light, 

Barbara McClintock, Jason Chin, Richard Jesse Watson, 

Jesse Joshua Watson, Oliver Jeffers, and more. 

I'm warmed to the toes just to think of them all.

Children's book authors and illustrators have a magical position.

They endow kids with value, saying,

 "These books are made for YOU.

You are worthy of stories true and deep, 

of stories that question and challenge,

embrace and illuminate."

Artists, writers, friends with your own creative bents,
thank you for sharing your special magic with us.

Here's to 2017.
May we be heart-bold in it.
May we create colossally,
speak bravely,
forgive freely,
love fiercely
as if this is the only today we have.

Books!

When the Sea Turned to Silver  by Grace Lin
Switch by Ingrid Law
The Storyteller - Evan Turk
Hap-pea All Year  by Keith Baker
Maybe Something Beautiful -  F. Isabel Campoy, Theresa Howell, Rafael Lopez

Bucket List

Things to do on your third stroke-aversary:

Sketch. 

Read.
Write.
Dig for treasure. 
My treasure might be hiding in the mountain of dirty laundry downstairs.
Or maybe in shuttling wildebeests to lessons, or practice.
Or maybe the treasure is in every speck of this beautiful daily dirt.

The sun is shining,
the flowers are out.
It's beautiful.

Being alive is good, my friends.
It's so good.

Lucky?

 SCBWI's drawing prompt for March is LUCKY.

I got to thinking about luck,

and what it means to me. 

With or without four-leaf clovers, book contracts, 

double-rainbows or pots of gold,

I am wishing-wells full of the best kind of luck.

I have beauty all around me -

in sky and earth, 

in people with all their glorious quirks,

in a roof over my head, clean water,

in laughter and forgiveness.

And I am free - 

free to write, to make art, to learn,
dream, wish, pray,
to hope.

I believe thankfulness and hope can fill the darkest sky with stars.

That's my kind of lucky.

Books:

The Wishing of Biddy Malone by Joy Cowley, illustrated by Christopher Denise

The Woman Who Flummoxed the Fairies by Heather Forest, illustrated by Susan Gaber

Green by Laura Vaccaro Seeger

Light and Wishes

 

This year, this crazy Everest of a year!

Out of all of it - 

the stroke, 

the sickness,

the faintings,

the heart surgery -

out of all this year, 

I have packed this jewel into my life suitcase:

Even in dark times, there is light.

    Maybe not a beacon, blazing with answers.

    Maybe not something you can grab onto or tangibly feel.

    Maybe not a voice that speaks that everything will be alright

      - because sometimes, it's not alright.

    Sometimes the rotten stuff still happens - 

      like war, and poverty, and cancer, and loss.   

But I have this for you, my friends...

Even in the dark times, there is light.

    Light of hope in something better. 

    Light of remembering shining moments already lived.

    Light of kindness and compassion in friends and strangers. 

    Light of faith.

For me, it is faith in Divine Arms 

that stooped down to walk in human skin

and faced trouble with love. 

in Divine Arms that are just there, like in these old words - 

 

                      "the eternal One is your hiding place, 

                       and underneath are the everlasting arms."

Even my darkest times this year, 

there was light.

Not blazing. But enough.

Even in my most scared, most vulnerable times,  

there was this awareness of not being alone.

Not anything tangible. But enough.

Everlasting Arms.

Here is my wish for you, friends.

I wish for you 

Thankfulness

in each of the sacred rites of the day - 

dishes, drop-offs,
broken pencils,
squabbles and stomps,

"stop wiping your face with pancake!" 

"don't squirt tomatoes on the ceiling!"
and writer's block,

and in all the great gulps,  too -

a happy home,

a healthy heart, 

life.

Love

like everlasting arms, 

Love that surrounds and lifts 

when you can't lift yourself.

 

Joy 

that goes down to your very roots and comes up laughing.

and Light. 

I wish you the deeps, my friends. 

Blissful Christmas!

Bright New Year!

Beautiful Life!

 

When we need a little hope...

Who says angels smile all the time?

Jelly jars,
colored beach glass
and beeswax candles
on my grandmother's silver tea tray...

I lit a candle with the kids last night.
We talked about hope.
about promises
and longed-for things.

Eight years ago, I was told I couldn't have children.
I was lost at sea,
grasping for a new direction,
for something to hold on to.



That Christmas, my sister-in-law gave me a present,
a simple linen square, sewn with one word:    

hope.

I stared over and over and over at that sewn word, 

trying to own it.

hope.

It became my tangible reminder
that help is never far,
even when we can't see or feel or think through our hard times.

And that season, eight years ago, is when I started writing, actually sitting at a desk, plotting and birthing stories. Which I'm still doing today.

My four sweet endings, you've seen.

Hope is worth every penny of the wait.

Hope is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul

And sings the tune without words

And never stops at all

- Emily Dickinson

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

 - Oscar Wilde

For you, my artist and writer friends, hopeful by nature, 

hopeful for someone, somewhere to pick up your work and be changed, 

may your work be rich and deep,

may your hearts be lightened

and your hopes become solid.

 A beautiful book about hope:

  

Gleam and Glow, by Eve Bunting, illustrated by Peter Sylvada