I want to be that woman

Two authors I respect immensely have recently lost a fellow author to cancer. In an online memorial statement of sorts, both authors shared what a contribution their friend made to their little writing community, how she was always so positive and giving, and how her loss has left a major hole in their lives. After reading their deceased friend's final blog post, I made a startling discovery: I want to be her. I'm not being disrespectful or crass, and don't get me wrong: I don't want to struggle through cancer and ultimately lose the battle, but I want to live my life as she did.

Her final blog post was basic, and yet it told a much greater story about who she was as a person. She discussed where she was at with her writing, how she was doing with chemo treatments, and what her goals were in respect to RWA's Golden Heart contest. I read her post through misty eyes as I realized that she was actively battling advanced cancer, yet not only had she refused to give up her dream of writing, not only was she continuing to submit her work to contests, she was shoring up her readership with words of encouragement. How many people do you know who would take the time out of their day whilst trying to survive cancer to write a blog post to encourage you in your dreams? Not many.

And that's why I want to be her. No matter that she hadn't hit the big time with publishing, no matter her personal struggles, she was writing because it's what she wanted to do. I think that's the ultimate definition of a fighter. This one post gave a quick glimpse into what it must have been like to work alongside such an incredible person; that no matter where she was in her writing career, she was guaranteed to be part of your personal cheering section.

And so I'm tired of worrying if my work will ever sell or how much I'll offend family by what I write. I'm tired of letting stress and fatigue get in the way of my pursuits. I'm a big dreamer, and it's about time that I truly started to live the dream. I still care if those I love don't care for my work, but I'm not going to let that worry contribute to other excuses in favor of procrastination. We don't know how much time we have to do our thing here, but I'd like to think that should I know the end is coming, I'll go down swinging and cheering everyone else along in the process.

Wow.