I'm falling asleep and it's only one in the afternoon. I've been up all night rewriting my story. I decided to do that after I read an editing book, I forget the name, it's in my bedroom somewhere. It seems to me that the easiest part about getting published is the writing. Once that's over there's so much more to do. Promotion is a bitch. I have my friends and family backing me up, they're doing a lovely job of that. It helps when you have them by your side. But enough mush.

My birthday is in six days and I can't wait. Actually, I can. I'm not looking forward to it at all. I would much rather be back in kindergarten sucking my thumb on a cot at naptime. You spend your entire childhood preparing to be an adult and then you get there (well almost there) and you wish you were right back in the times when everything was so simple. The years have gone by so fast.

I can still remember when my mother was giving me a Just For Me perm and burning the back of my beck with the hot comb. (You know, the one you had to put on the stove so the metal comb part could heat up? That one. For years. Until she went electric.) Sharing the bed with my cousins and my baby brothers when we went up to my grandmother's house in White Plains. Then getting separated because we were giggling too much to be actually sleeping. The first time I ever tried to make dinner and ended up almost burning down the kitchen. (You really have to watch that flash fry thing. I saw it on Food Network and thought I was nice.) You look back and see things and wonder how you made it through. Like the world was ending at that exact moment but you still found a way. Time passes and you live and you learn and then get Luvs.

I think I've found a lot of myself writing this book. Over the past few months I've learned a lot more about me than I ever knew. And I love that. Life is a learning experience and I love the fact that I get something new out of it everyday. I've been challenged in ways I never thought possible over the last two years and I've come out of it better and stronger than I was before. I know how to handle things now, I can deal with the fast balls that life throws at me. Granted, I hate baseball so that analogy is probably moot.

As time moves forward and I continue to grow and continue to love me like I do, I know I'll keep learning. And the more you learn, the more you grow. Pretty soon, I'll be untouchable. But there's still time for that. Right now, I'm just living my life like it's golden.