I just came back from our mailbox, again. I guess the third time’s a charm cause there it was…a very special magazine. Not just any magazine, a magazine that sponsored my most recent published article, The Family History Club. I held the magazine and cried. My article is about another day, that I cried yet again, while I faced the anger of my mother’s death and the fear that I would die breast cancer too.
Calling myself a “writer” (thank you dear Jen!) is still not natural. After much deliberation, I decided that I’d give it a try. Just days later, the Census dude came by and asked me my occupation. I declared, “Freelance Writer.” Good job self, knew ya could do it! He said, “What is your annual income?” I replied, “Ummm, I’m not paid yet.” He quickly shot back, “Oh, I won’t put that down, cause it’s more like a hobby.”
Great, just great. Even the Census dude knows I’m a fraud.
Then another rejection letter came. I figured it was safe to say that if I referred to myself as a writer just one more time, that I would be placed into some formal institution that housed former child stars gone bad, or people who thought they were E.T., Mr. T or Elvis’s banana and peanut butter sandwich. To be honest with you, I’m the last person to think that I’d turn out to be a writer. I have a Criminal Justice degree. I h-a-t-e-d English class (all of them…sorry Mrs. Shuba and Mr. Morgan). My handwriting is more akin to hieroglyphics. My sentence structures are questionable. My word choices are wobbly. I even make words up and use them like they’re real. My recent creation, “hilariosity”. Catchy, huh?
While choosing to call myself a writer is not natural, neither is my choosing faith over fear.
The first round of The Family History Club was a “maybe”. This may sound lame, but a “maybe” is really, really encouraging to this unknown freelance writer. The editor told me that she would reconsider, if I edited it. She also added that she wasn’t sure if I had really faced my fear. Reading that, hurt. Not nearly as much as when I realized that she was right. I wrote about what I “would do” but not what I “was doing” about my fear. In the middle of the editing process was where God opened my heart, to practice the process of trusting Him more than my fear. As I look back now, if my article had gotten either a “yes” or “no” the first time around, I would have missed God’s “purpose” that was neatly tucked away in the editing process.
Writing, like facing fear, is a process. There are layers that require time and a whole lot of faith.
I’m certain (now) that being a writer and remaining faith-ful is what God wants me to do. While I have hilariosity (see how smooth that was) in me while I pet my hot-off-the-press-article, it’s all the sweeter because God revealed His heart, while I worked through the editing process. It comforts me to know that it is in the edits of life where God remains faithful to meet me. Unbeknownst to me, I began the face-my-fear-”editing-process” when I showed up for my first mammogram, which led to a surgeon, which let to an out-patient biopsy, which led to another mammogram which led to an MRI (aka: such a p-r-o-c-e-s-s). That MRI was the same MRI that God used to birth the article, and now this blog post, where I get to showcase the new word hilariosity. It’s a win-win as far as I see it.
Tomorrow brings October which is National Breast Cancer Awareness month. I leave you with just two questions. How has breast cancer impacted your life? And, will you try to infuse the word “hilariosity” in your daily life? 
