Fairytales can come true...
I stalked a UPS truck today. I think before I get any further into this story it's important to come clean about my behavior. It wasn't pretty. My 12 year old son (all 5' 11" of him) was hungry and I assumed I had plenty of time to take him to lunch. The UPS tracking app said my package was due at the "end of day."
Now, The Boy reminds me of an electric pencil sharpener when he's hungry. Or termites. Either way, denying him food for seconds, let alone minutes is risking life and limb. We were heading down the hill, out of our neighborhood when I spyed the UPS truck coming toward me and turning on one of the streets below my house. OMG! My 1st Novel "Summer Secrets" is in a box on that truck! (20 whole copies.)
Now, be honest with yourself. What would you do? (What would Jesus do?) Would you calmly continue down the hill to the sushi place? Would you meet your friend on time and enjoy a relaxing lunch while watching your son consume an enormous amount of potstickers and shrimp tempura? After all, the box of books will be there, on the stoop, when you get back in an hour.
Or is there another option?
Perhaps you might pull a u-turn at 30 mph and rush back to your house screeching into the driveway, sitting there with the motor running for 2 entire minutes waiting for the truck while The Boy is yelling at you about being hungry. Then, because those two minutes seem to be taking FOREVER, you might whip the mini-van into reverse, and drive around the two back streets in your neighborhood thinking if you found the aforementioned UPS truck you could ask for the box. Then when you realize it isn't on either of those streets you freak out (tell your son to shut up because he is yelling at you to stop speeding), and rush back to your house only to see the UPS truck in front of the house with the box safely on the front porch.
(It's right about now you feel a bit like an ass.)
The Boy is still yelling "Really, Mom, Really."
HOWEVER, in my defense... I have my box which I cut open. Now, in my hand, is my novel. I am officially an Author.
My FB exploded when I posted the selfie of the book in my hand. The people of my wall living this journey with me over the past few years. <3
I've had quite a few successes in my marketing career. None of them compare to the emotional journey this undertaking has been. Five years with a nebulous goal off in the distance where "someday" I would complete the novel I was working on and perhaps someone may actually like what I wrote. Maybe. Always in the back of my mind my father's overt lesson "Do the best damn job... somebody will notice" (It's a much longer story.) Of course I knew the odds were against me but I went for it.
And finally, A box appeared. A book was inside. The Boy got his sushi and as boys tend to do, they calm down once food has reached their tummy. He still doesn't understand why I needed to get the book first but maybe he will learn the lesson of perseverance in the face of a project and relate it back to a time when his mom drove through his neighborhood like a jackass chasing a UPS truck just to get a box of her books. She couldn't even wait another 2 minutes in the driveway. She was THAT excited.
