7/31/13.  In the middle of the night, I typed the last sentence of my Young Adult novel "In the Middle".  I celebrated and felt free and easy for approximately half a day, then I flipped back open my laptop and fixed a section that didn't feel exactly right.  Because that's what writers do--they always feel like something could be fixed or rearranged for more impact.  It's a sickness.  A strange and wonderful sickness.

The beginning of August marks the end of July's Camp NaNoWriMo, 31 days of writers worldwide creating.  Campers are encouraged to pick their own word count goal (mine was 26,364 words, oddly specific because that magical number brought my novel to 50k words) and go for it.  I rounded out July with 38,406 words (62028 words in total), 12k above my goal.  I'll take it.

In March I began this journey with Lucy, an orphaned teenager burdened by the weight of her parents' deaths.  Lucy was angry and unpleasant, scarred and in pain.  She wasn't the only one in the little town of Mitte who struggled with loss and regret.  In the Middle forced me to look at death and remorse from a handful of angles, mourn with each person, and then offer a bit of hope.  Perhaps it will never be published, let alone read and understood by an audience, but recording their story took me on a journey I will always remember.

To Lucy, Oliver, Jasper, Perdita, Letty, Duke, Magnolia, Tessa, Johanna, Norman, Millie, Sadie, Angus, Sal, Bud, Vera--even Derek and Tanya...  Thank you for waking me up.

In the wee hours of the morning--3:14 a.m. if we're getting all technical and stuff--I finally brought my current manuscript to 50k words, the length of an average novel (or so the peeps at National Novel Writing Month tell me).  This story, best described as a young adult paranormal thriller, woke me up one chilly morning this past March.  I read a lot of paranormal fiction, but it's nothing I really had any desire to write until this story shook me by the shoulders and demanded I pay attention.

In April I tried to take this particular story (currently titled In the Middle) from about 13k to 50k by participating in Camp NaNoWriMo.  For those of you not familiar with the way NaNoWriMo works, allow me to explain.  The other NaNos want you to write a 50k-word novel in one month (typically November), with emphasis on daily word count goals. If you've got a a big enough stash of junk food and are good at disciplining yourself and/or know how to blacklist most of the Internet from your computer, you will sit down at a computer, write for a month and magically a book appears at the end of it.  You grin like a maniac and shake your aching fists in the air proclaiming your triumph over evil--I mean, words!  Words!  Then you quickly realize you haven't showered in a week (or three), clamp those armpits shut again, and wander off to tell your family they can call off the Search-and-Rescue mission.

If you're not so good at the whole NaNoWriMo thing, nothing happens.  You probably have a social life, a job, a family who still likes/recognizes you--all bonuses.  The most social we get during NaNoWriMo months is usually comparing word counts on our latest word battles.  On Twitter.  That's, like, not even a real website.  That's people simultaneously yelling their opinions into a crowded room.  #yesI'mtalkingtoyou.  Sometimes I write on my porch just to remember what the air feels like on my albino skin.

Why do I do this to myself, again?  Oh yeah, because I really, really love it.

All kidding aside, the lovely, caffeinated folks behind NaNoWriMo have inspired a staggering number of people to write books.  Most of the time, that's a good thing.  And, no, I'm not talking about you, E. L. James.  Stopit! 

The beauty of Camp is the ability to pick a goal for your month of concentrated writing that fits in with your life instead of 50k, which used to be the only option (go big or go home!)  Optimistic, or possibly sadistic, I aimed high--That ended up too ambitious of a goal when it all boiled down to it.  I lost a horse to old age and arthritis and gained two more within the same month.  Historically, I'd say I'm pretty crappy with change, especially change involving the equine species.  Emotional upheaval doesn't usually lend itself to my creative process unless you consider my creative process eating a ton of chocolate and threatening to move away because, and I quote, "y'all are crazy!"

I managed six-thousand words that month.  That's, like, 1/8 of my goal.  Or something.  I'm bad at Math.  Numbers aside, it was no bueno.  My main character stuck in the middle of something big, something that changed the whole storyline... and I couldn't write myself out of it because I lost it all.  Poof!  The passion that woke me out of hibernation on a frigid Saturday morning fizzled away, even though I knew I had a story worthy of bleeding onto the page.  I began to feel anxiety that I would never rescue poor Lucy from her predicament.  I feared In the Middle would get buried in the old files on my laptop, never to see the light of day again. 

A similar thing happened to me last July (and August.  And Septem--do you see where I'm going with this?) while working on the second draft of my first novel.  I'd lost my horse and best friend of 19 years to colic and the devastation wiped my mind completely clear of everything, including my creativity.  My main character, known for her sarcasm, couldn't think of anything funny to say.  For months, literally, I stared at my laptop screen all day, lucky to work out a couple sentences in all of that time.  The whole thing seemed pointless and discouraging.  I finished the redraft of that first novel only days before NaNoWriMo started up in November.  When NaNoWriMo began, I started the sequel to my first novel, which I eventually finished up on January 15th of this year.  Can't win 'em all, they say, but I won when I didn't give up.  The second book was just the icing on the cake.  (Did someone say cake?  It is NaNoWriMo again, which means JUNK FOOD!  It's for the books, I swear!)

Life, and death, runs in cycles--and I guess it is my Kryptonite, all this grief.  And I need to learn to deal with it like Superman does.  On second thought, no, probably not.  Kryptonite renders him a whiny cry-baby.  Dang it!  That's the only comic book analogy I have!

Thankfully Camp NaNoWriMo occurs each July, too, which doesn't make a lot of sense to me because it is the worst possible month for a mom of four to accomplish anything beyond brushing her teeth each morning (and often that is questionable).  But they didn't design their calendar around me, so I just have to deal.  Camp is the perfect excuse to push myself to get back into the habit of writing a lot, so I went for it.  This time, I set a goal of 26,394 words to bring "In the Middle" to 50k words.  At 3:14 this morning, and six days before my deadline, I hit my mark.  

**

The novel's not completed, as much as I wish it was, but the finish line is so close I can almost taste it (have you ever noticed how much I talk about food?  I have.).  Now I'm pouring my focus into getting as close as possible to "The End" before July reaches its end.  This month's success is the total opposite of last year's July paralysis

Being trapped inside your own head trying to figure out how to heal is not pleasant.  Being able to look back and see how far you've come and realize you really CAN do anything is a feeling beyond words.  Three-fourteen this morning found me staring at a blinking cursor and the word count screen with my heart bursting full of allllllll the emotions.  No one can possibly know what it feels like unless it is your struggle and your triumph.  Today I feel very powerful, kinda like the opposite of Superman hugging a bar of Kryptonite.  I think the analogy worked that time!

Now back to the story...

**Special thanks goes out to my writing doula, Courtney, whose enthusiasm (or, at least facade of enthusiasm) keeps pushing me to press on even when my eyes are bursting into flames.  Thanks to the Camp NaNoWriMo crew, of course.  Also, a humungo shout out to the dude who wrote Write or Die!  I don't know what it is about that red computer screen that makes me want to type complete gibberish just to make it go away. And, as always, a big "whaddup!" to my muses, Ish and Moe.  Keep it up, boys.  Mama needs a new pair of riding boots!

Here is a snippet from the novel I began earlier this year.  I'd hoped to finish it up in April, but April was a trainwreck.  Camp NaNoWriMo began today, and my goal is to add an additional 26k words to this novel to bring it to 50k and, hopefully, completion.  For those of you following along, here's my progress today.  Meet Lucy, the main character of "In the Middle". 

~~~

Being slow as a turtle—even slower than that, it seemed—wasn’t my norm.  My body was aerodynamic, thin and sleek.  My legs used to reach outward with the grace of the gazelle, bounding me forward with ease.  They said I would go places, that I’d have my pick of colleges.  Coach lined up college recruiters for our biggest meets, all I had to do was show up and let go.  My heart would do the rest.

I missed the wind in my face and the teardrops that collected in the corners of my eyes as the world blurred behind me.  I missed the crunch of pebbles beneath my shoes.  I missed the tickle of my ponytail grazing the back of my neck with each swaying step.  I missed pushing through the burn in my lungs and deep within my legs.  Faster, faster, faster.  I missed every single shin splint and weeping blister.  I missed running so hard the world spun behind my eyes, struggling to catch up.  Heck, I even missed throwing up in the grass because I’d pushed myself to my limits.  Even the worst day on the track paled in comparison to what my life looked like now.  This was not life at all.

They said I would go places.  Somehow I doubted this is what they meant.

I bit my lip to keep from sobbing as I continued forward at my numbingly slow pace.  The forest around me fell silent except for the low crunch of the pine needles under my feet. The sulfuric air grew thicker and so heavy that it pressed on my chest and I had to stop to draw in a really good breath.  My throat burned with the effort, and I coughed.   The fire was close, and so was my rescue. 

The pines crowded close together ahead with branches intertwined in protest.  Even the forest wanted to keep me stranded in this pit.  I knew following the trees until I could find a large enough opening to squeeze through would mean going to my right or left instead of forward.  Sideways was frustrating to me.  Sideways wouldn’t get me away from Oliver or Mitte, two things I wanted more than anything.  It was not one of my brightest ideas, but I gritted my teeth and pushed forward into the arms of the pines.  The needles welcomed me, sliding across my skin like feathers.  The tang of pine tar overtook the smell of soot and destruction.   Maybe this wasn’t so bad, after all.  Spreading the branches of the tangle before me, I smiled.  Yes, this plan would work.  Adios, Oliver!

Almost as soon as I’d thought it, the needles turned against me.  Pins made contact with my face, pricking my lips and drawing tiny beads of blood. 

“Ouch!”  I yelped, trying to bring my arm up to shield my face, which only made me more of a human pincushion.  No one came to help me, even though it was pretty obvious that I was stuck.

Oliver left.  He left.

He didn’t owe me anything, and I figure most of the messes I’d found myself in since fate dumped me in Mitte had been his fault.  Not even two minutes ago I wanted as far away from that boy as humanly possible.  Finally, something had gone my way.  From where I cowered, shrouded in flesh-eating vegetation, I couldn’t bring myself to feel happy he’d gotten around to taking a hint. 

If Dad was here he’d have torn himself in two to protect me.  There was no way he’d let me wander off alone into the wilderness, no matter how much I kicked and screamed. Dad would have kicked and screamed right back at me, and then, when he’d had enough, thrown me over his shoulder and carried me back to safety.  I would have hated him every step of the way, as much as I loved him.  He knew never to give up on me, but it didn’t matter anymore.  Even Dad had abandoned me as the dragon drew near.

A flood of anger surged through me, and its intensity vibrated wildly across my skin like a bolt of lightning.  Feeling sorry for myself wouldn’t do a single thing except kill me faster.  I was no damsel in distress, and this was the furthest thing from a fairy tale.  Death would track me to this forest, one way or another.  A man couldn’t stop the inevitable.  I felt it as sure as the pulse pounding in my veins.  Wiping the blood from my mouth, I forced myself further into the green.  Goosebumps sprung on the back of my neck and rippled down my arms.  What in the--? The frantic rhythm slamming through my body crushed the breath from my lungs.  


My grandpa suffered his first heart attack right in front of me as I blew out the candles on my birthday cake on my tenth birthday.   I’ll never forget--his eyes bugged out of his head like he was a fish out of water, gulping for air and finding none.  Yeah, my life sucked.

I haven't blogged in weeks.  Maybe you noticed.  Maybe you didn't.  Maybe you never even knew I had a blog.  Maybe you never cared to know the random things that pass through my brain.  If you didn't care, then I guess you wouldn't be here reading this now, so nevermind that bit.

At any rate, I've not had a lot to say.  A lot happened in April, but the words kept to themselves, mostly.

I lost a sweet horse, Mariah, to a heart-breaking decision I didn't want to have to make.  Her weight was good through the winter, but her joints just seemed to give way.  We spent the afternoon before the vet's visit brushing her and stuffing her full of the treats she loved so much...  After I had to chase her back to my property when she turned tail and ran through the neighbor's hay field.  That burst of spunk caused me to second-guess myself up until the moment she walked away from the barn for good.  Really, there wasn't anything to second-guess.  Even with her halting gait, she nearly bowled me over to go through the gate for the last time, never to return.  My step-dad says I'm reading too much into it--she was just a horse, after all--but I think she knew her time had come.  She was ready to be whole again in some other place.

Two days after we said good-bye to Mariah I began what I assumed would be the long process of horse-hunting and test-rides.  That day we looked at two ponies and bought the second one, a grey draft pony named Ellie.  She reminds me a lot of the pony I had when I was a kid, another horse I loved and lost.  Thank goodness I can think of that pony and smile.  The wounds are still a bit too fresh from losing my Moe and Mariah nine months from each other.  Back to Ellie, though--she is talented and quick, so I've been working at slowing her down and getting her back in shape for the kids to ride.  I've been riding a lot, for me, at over two hours a day in the saddle.  I'm one tired muchacha, most days.

My step-dad decided the tack room in our barn was in need of a major overhaul, so they began that project around the time they purchased the grey pony.  Now instead of dust, cobwebs, and mouse droppings, we have wood paneling, fluorescent lighting, and linoleum.  There are cross-ties for three horses instead of only one.  It's super-fancy.  You know, I've been riding for the past 30+ years in squalor so I don't know how to behave in nice places.  I might have to let the mice and birds into the tack room to relieve themselves, for old time's sake. 

Yesterday my sister also bought a horse, a bay Tennessee Walker gelding.  His name WAS Henry, but he has been renamed "Romeo".  Despite my mare's (Trinity) best attempts to scare the bejeebies out of him with her crazy front legs and ear-splitting squeal, he is not very concerned with the goings-on of our barn.

The reintroduction of my family to the barn has been difficult.  For decades it has been my safe haven, the place I go to escape everything.  One by one, the horses are being replaced.  Board by board, [beautiful] improvements erase the little bits that remain of my memories of horses past.  The air is laced with the conversations of others instead of the whisper of the breeze.  It is all changing.  The changes are not all unpleasant, but, to me, they are all related--directly or indirectly--to losing a loved one.  I'm still grieving.  Not with the intensity I did when I lost Moe, but it's still there.  I'm crying for all of them.  There's little emotional leeway for much else.

Things have been happening in my non-horsey life, too.  A while ago I entered a contest attempting to attract the interest of a literary agent.  My submission didn't make it past the slushpile readers whose job it was to wade through all of the entries for the agents.  At the conclusion of the contest we were given a second chance to submit a Twitter pitch so the agents could see what they'd missed.  My Twitter pitch received requests from one agent and a brand new publishing company.  The agent ended up passing once she read my query and first several pages, but the publishing company requested my full manuscript two weeks ago.  Last night as Mr. Ohboy and I walked back from feeding the horses, I checked my e-mail and found a message from the publisher saying they were interested in signing me. 

This afternoon I talked with the woman who runs the company, firing off questions and concerns and sharing our mutual disdain for "50 Shades of Grey" for over an hour.  The premise of the company is promising:  Treating writers with respect, fostering community amongst the authors in this house, allowing authors as much control as possible, and a lot of other things that made me feel comfortable about possibly letting this company help me bring my stories to the world.  The biggest problem?  They are so new their first round of acquisitions isn't set to publish for another month or so.  They are a total unknown.  On one hand, it's flattering to be considered for this fledgling company, getting in on the ground floor, so to speak.  On the other hand, I worry that once things get moving they will discover that their nice ideals and flexibility aren't making them money and all of those "pros" will disappear.  What if they don't survive?  What if they take my reputation with them?  I'm not sure if any of that makes any sense, but I've been processing it all day long. 

The next step is to lay my eyeballs on their contract and figure out if it makes any sense to me.  It won't.  It's completely written in legal-ese.  I barely speak redneck-tinged English.

And then I think of this publisher, someone who doesn't know me from anyone, who personally read my manuscript and saw something of value in it, and in me.  Enough that she'd be willing to take a chance by bringing me in to be part of the building effort for her company.  It's scary and humbling, all at the same time. 

I've not signed anything or given a commitment of any kind because all I've had is a nice phone conversation with a stranger.  Maybe I will wake up tomorrow and this will all be a weird dream, but tonight I will smile remembering her compliments.  I don't get enough of those, do you?

Also on the writing front--In April, I participated in Camp NaNoWriMo.  My hopes had been to add 30k words to a project I've been working on, a Young Adult thriller tentatively named "In the Middle".  With everything else going on, I managed about 10k.  This big "miss" did give me time to think about the plot a little, so look for more happening with that story in the near future.

What else?  Oh, I have a new nephew!  He's adorable and I need to visit him.  Other than that, I haven't had time for much else.  What about you?  Anything big happening where you are?

I want to be somebody.
I want to make a difference.
I want to touch hearts.
I want to smile.
I want to make others smile.
I want to be good at something.
I want to be good for someone.
I want to inspire.
I want to be inspired.


What do you want?

I decided to edit today, with three kids in the house, one of whom I was attempting to potty-train.  My husband spent most of the day working.  In other words, I was torturing myself.  

My goal was to finish the opening scene of book 1, which I did.  I felt good about the changes I made, but when I re-read it just now.  Meh.  

Maybe it will feel better tomorrow.  

Nothing I've written is remotely near being ready to publish.  There are sentences to weed and phrases to prune.  Characters to cultivate or burn away, the choice is up to me.  Plots need water or redirection like vines on a trellis.  In other words, a ton of gardening.

Have I mentioned I'm not particularly great at keeping green things green?  Gardening is a bad metaphor.

This week I gave myself the option of writing or not writing, editing or not editing.  Laying in bed catching up on bad t.v. and afternoon naps instead of deadlines and writer's block.  Staying up late watching Conan because I can or going to bed obscenely early because there's no word count left.  My break should be refreshing.  My synapses should be snoozing so they can return ready to fire more quickly and easily.  But no....  That's not what's happening.

Instead, my stomach is churning with each day that passes in which no forward progress has been made on my dream.  I don't like being in limbo.  I don't want to rush this thing, but I hate being suspended in this void.

I'm reading to distract myself, to refuel my creativity and see how others more successful than myself spin a tale.  Apparently it's not working, because instead of losing myself in these books, I push my way through each one.  My brain is persistant, nudging me every few pages.  "Pssst!  Hey!  If she can do this, so can you!"

My husband is not helping.  "Finish that book yet?"  Every. Single. Time. He. Walks. In. The. Door.  I love him, I do.  But sometimes, I loathe him.

Mommy Dearest isn't helping, either.  When I described to her why I was overwhelmed about editing my first book (a.k.a. "The Book Written Entirely In Passive Voice"), she shocked me by telling me I was probably over-analyzing my book.  A few minor changes,she said, and I would think it's ready to go!  She's my mama.  It's written into her job description to believe I can do no wrong--except for that typo on page 35 and the other one on page 110--but it's still strange to have her on more of an accelerated timeframe than myself.  I probably owe her money.

It's all about patience.  When God handed out patience, I think I was in the back of the line, and by the time I reached the front, there were only crumbs left in the bag.  "Here."  I imagine God said as he dropped the specks of patience in my palm.  "Good luck with that.  And, remember, 'thou shalt not kill'."  Then He walked away bent over in hysterical laughter.  To make it even more hilarious, He pumped my veins full of the blood of Irish, Scottish, and German ancestors.  Well-played, God.  Welllllll-played.

On top of it all, the crazy (and not-so-crazy) thought occurred to me to write the third installment first just to see if I could and the stars aligned.  And by "stars aligned", I mean "does any of this make a lick of sense?"  If I chose to write more now, I would need to find another place to live because I am pretty sure that would be the end of my marriage, right there.  My husband's already convinced these books will never see the light of day past my computer screen and I'm just pretending to write. 

So, yeah.  There's a lot of pressure.  From books that aren't but very well could be my own...  From my well-meaning (but adolescent) husband...  From my usually well-planned but impetuous mother.  But mostly, and most deeply, from my own self. 

I'm not letting anyone talk me into putting anything out there before it's really and truly time, but I sure hope this feeling of suffocation decides to leave me soon.

Tonight I did it.  I finally completed--in 2-1/2 months--what I was hoping would only take me one.  But who's counting, anyway?

Book 2 Draft 1 is complete at 50,004 words.  It is not perfect, but I never expected it would be.  Show me someone who writes the perfect first draft, and I'll point out that it probably took them 20 years to do it. 

There is a lot of smoothing to be done, details to be added, and probably I will end up with a completely different story when I eventually go through and do a second draft of the thing.....  Kind of like when I did a second draft of my FIRST book.  But right now I feel better about this one.  I think that's just denial.  Time and space will reveal how horrible it actually is.  For the moment, I am proud. 

Thank you to the hundreds of people who endured my word count posts on Facebook.  I know it is one of the many reasons you hide me in your newsfeed, and I love you still.  Don't expect me to like the accomplishments you are proud of, but we're still okay.  Haha.  But, seriously, thank you for your encouragement--especially those who have no idea what I'm talking about most of the time.  Yes, I realize that's most of you.

(Is it weird that I still get surprised when people say, "You're writing a book?"  I've kept it this big secret and all.... ;-)  )

And even though I'm not 100% he deserves it, I'd like to say thank you to my amazing husband.  He's my biggest fan, always, and yet he gives me so much grief about my starting on a second book when I haven't published the first.  There's a method to my madness this time, dude.  Take a chill pill.  Just for your impatience, maybe I'll start writing installment three.

The flu has made me testy, my bad.

Tomorrow--today, officially--I will rest and do whatever it is when I'm not worried about self-imposed deadlines.  It likely involves mountains of laundry and even bigger mountains of pet fur lurking in every corner of the house.  Exotic, I know.

Unless I decide to do something really crazy like enter this contest, in which case I would have to forego said piles of things and figure out stuff I've never done before (pitch and picking an excerpt).

Tonight, I sleep.

... or I'd like to think it is.

I hit 40k words just a little bit ago.  Finally.  I almost went to bed early because I've been dragging all day.  Instead, something told me that it would be a perfect night to check out the Write Or Die desktop program I bought before Christmas.

The premise of Write Or Die is that you can set goals--crazy or easy, or somewhere in between--for your writing, and if you don't hit those goals, then you are punished.  The punishments range anywhere from violins screeching in the background to words deleting themselves from the screen.  If you are idle for too long the screen fades from pink to red, which I found to be really annoying. So tonight, I managed to write about 1084 words in an hour, which is  some sort of record for me.  I'm excited about this new gadget to hopefully motivate me to get to the finish line.  I'm only 10k off now!  Yay!

And now I am falling asleep at the keyboard.  That's the price you pay for an hour of super-speed.

Dance-Off! 

Okay, not really.  It just sounded exciting.  I'm still in my pajamas weighing the pros and cons of doing anything else besides nursing my current mug o' joe.  So far, nothing has been so important that I've moved.

The ringing in of 2013 was anti-climactic.  Some tummy issue sidelined me from my family's annual karaoke/card game party, so I curled up in bed with my laptop, a tall glass of water (I'm a lush), and a couple of Twilight movies I haven't seen in ages but try to avoid watching when my husband is around.  My husband is my biggest fan and would sit through a Twilight marathon if I begged him to--and secretly, he would like it just a little bit.  That's the kind of thing he holds over my head, though.  Eventually I pay a price for such injustices to his manhood.

But, getting back to New Year's Eve...  The house was mine.  Empty.  Friends, I have never lived alone.  Never.  Maybe someday my own voice will echo back to me and I will miss the sheer chaos.  For now, the solitude is as close as I will come to straight-up magic.  My family's party could have gone for a week solid, and it would have been the next best thing to laying on a beach somewhere with a fruity drink in my hand.  Sadly, the boys returned at about 11:30p.m., and we flipped on the t.v. ten minutes before midnight only to see Carson Daly and his female co-host holding a conversation they wouldn't shut up about until 10 seconds before midnight.  Horrible--I want Dick Clark back. 

Anyway...

Uninterrupted, I managed to plunk out a little over 1900 words, reaching my re-re-revised goal of 38k by the end of 2012.  Shortly after the ball dropped, bringing in 2012, I was snuggled up with my laptop.  A year later, I am in the same place, same characters, different story.  My eyes opened this morning, and my first thoughts were, "Now what happens with my characters?"

Well, no.  My first thoughts were, "Coffee.  Where's my coffee?"  But, the two kind of go hand-in-hand, so it's almost the same thing.  The point is, clearly I am where I am supposed to be.

The end of the world didn't happen, not yet, unless we're already smack dab in the middle of the zombie apocalypse and we just haven't noticed.  So what are you going to do to bring yourself to the place you want to be?  I'm not talking resolutions, because there is something about a resolution that screams "You know I'm too hard.  Quit already."  It has to be something else--something you go for with fire, because failing isn't an option if you ever want things to change for the better.       

Maybe you're stuck on a big picture, when focusing on a single baby step is enough to begin.  Every journey starts with a single footstep... or keystroke... or glass of water.  Take that single footstep every day and by this time next year, you're at least 365 paces closer.  But I bet you're closer than that because momentum in one area of our lives tends to push us to take a step or two (maybe more!) along the way. 

So tell me what your journey is, and one baby step you'd like to take to get there.  Can I help you, even if it's just cheering from the sidelines as you baby-step your way through a year?