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Maile and I have been taking turns sleeping with Abra at night. The high pollen count here in the outskirts of Nashville have been keeping her up at night, coughing and itching, so one of us sleeps with her in a separate room where she won’t wake everyone up, and the other gets a good night sleep. One night off, one night on.

Tonight is my night for a good night’s sleep, so I’m keeping it brief.

* * * * *

I can already see the grins creeping on to the faces of two of my writer friends, Kristin Tennant and Jennifer Luitwieler. Some time ago the three of us each wrote a post about community – I was the bah-humbug of the group, the grumpy old troll who lives under the bridge. In other words, they talked about the virtues of community, while I mostly slobbered and scratched myself and talked about how wonderful it is to be a writer because I don’t have to talk to anyone else.

So why are their eyes lighting up? Because today I have to admit that they were right. I was (mostly) wrong.

You folks – the ones that read this blog, as well as my fellow writers out there – came through for me in a big way this week. You helped spread the word about my book, and I couldn’t be more pleased with how things have gone in the first 48 hours of its official existence.

Nearly 30 reviews by fellow bloggers.

More Facebook messages and Tweets than I can count.

Even three copies sold in England.

Without all of you, the book would be dying a quick death on the virtual shelves of the E-book world.

So thank you, you great big blob of a community. Thank you for your emails of appreciation for the book, the more than generous posts and reviews, and the words of encouragement. You all made Tuesday a fun and special day for me, and I appreciate it.

So I’ll keep writing if you all keep reading.

Community.

Who knew?

* * * * *

If you still haven’t bought a copy of my new E-book, you can read ten reasons why you should buy it HERE, or read a summary with links to buy it HERE. Please keep spreading the word! I can’t do it without you!

Two or three weeks ago, I called my mom. Maile, the kids, the bus, and I were somewhere in Florida. Maybe Jacksonville. I can’t remember exactly. Within a few seconds of my mom answering, I knew something was wrong.

“Shawn, I have some not-so-good news,” she said in a quavery voice reserved for funerals and personal catastrophes.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

Someone very close to us has cancer.

It’s rather shocking, actually, to discover something like this. It felt like discovering there was a traitor in our midst. I found myself wondering which nearly invisible cells in my own body were planning a revolt.Which tree was going to fall on our bus. I started seeing death behind every oncoming car, or hiding in every shadow.

* * * * *

Yesterday I found out that some very close friends of ours are miscarrying their baby. I don’t know the details. But the sadness is recognizable. Reminded me of standing next to Maile at a routine doctor’s visit when she was pregnant with our third child. The doctor looked up with pursed lips and confused eyebrows.

“I’m really sorry to tell you this,” she said. “But something isn’t right.” A few weeks later, Maile miscarried. Friends hugged us. We walked around our house quiet and empty.

* * * * *

There is something devastating about hope unattained. The unexpected diagnosis. The bright candle that turns into a smoldering wick. The “something isn’t right” speech. Sometimes, just sometimes, it makes me wonder if hope is worth it. Makes me want to live a life where I always expect the worst, keep my hand closed, my eyes on the ground in front of me. Too much looking out at horizons exposes one to the possibility of disappointment.

There’s a world we’ve never seen
There’s still hope between the dreams
The weight of it all could blow away
With a breeze
But if your waiting on the wind
Don’t forget to breathe
Because as the darkness gets deeper
We’re sinkin’ as we reach for love

– Jack Johnson, “All at Once”

* * * * *

Tuesday evening I went outside to help Maile’s brother till his garden. He and I took turns pushing the rototiller around, pushing all the old dead grass and hay under the rich brown soil. Then I raked out the dead stuff to the edges and piled it all into the wheelbarrow. The soil went from looking barren and rather unwilling to expectant. Open.

It takes a lot of turning over to reach that point. A lot of pounding and tearing and grinding of the soil. The rototiller grasped at the ground like giant claws. Our shovels bit into the edge of the garden.

As I worked the soil and the sun dropped behind those Tennessee hills, I thought of my friend with cancer. My friends losing their baby. They are being tilled. They are being ground.

But I know them, and I know their hearts.

And while it will not diminish the pain they feel now, I marvel at what rich soil they will become.

* * * * *

Have you ever been tilled? How did it change you?

If you know of whom I speak, please respect their privacy and refrain from mentioning their identities in the comments section.

Today is an exciting day for me! My E-book, Building a Life Out of Words, is finally available! I wanted to try to tell you what it’s about, but then my friend Stacy Barton (author of Surviving Nashville) wrote this, and I love how she describes it:

sometimes you try something based on a hunch, you stride out, hopeful that your instincts are true.

so is the case with my friend shawn smucker’s book, Building a Life Out of Words. i had read his work on his blog, enjoyed his perspective on life, faith, writing and family…appreciated the lyrical quality of his words.  and so when he asked me to contribute to his latest project, i was downright glad.  he published two of my short non-fiction pieces in this book and today i finished reading the whole of it.  it was as lovely as i had hoped…as honest and as hopeful.  i cried at least three times at the beauty and purity of his struggle and his hope.

Building a Life Out of Words is the story of his early travels as a full-time writer – how he fell into it almost accidentally, but not quite.  it is about the difficulty we face when being true, and the possibility of hope fulfilled for those of us who persevere.  it is a compelling story.

You can save yourself some time and purchase it now for your Nook, your Kindle, or you can go HERE and purchase the PDF version to read on your computer. But if you need some more convincing, here are ten reasons you should buy Building a Life Out of Words:

1) It costs $3.99. You can get a box of cereal, or a Starbucks coffee, or one gallon of gas, or……you could purchase my book that contains over 25,000 words of hope and encouragement.

2) If you wish you were doing something for a living besides what you’re currently doing, this book might give you some ideas on how to begin making the transition.

3) If you’re a writer, the following alone makes it worth the price of admission: nine awesome contributors give practical advice about how to write for a living. Andi Cumbo talks about Kickstarter; Bryan Allain regales you with tales of aliens and roller coasters; Ed Cyzewski gives away his number one way of finding work; Jason Boyett talks self-promotion; Jeff Goins gives practical advice on where to begin; Jennifer Luitwieler is the reluctant PR master; Ken Mueller talks about life on the other side of a pink slip; Kristin Tennant reframes the introvert’s writing life; and Stacy Barton likes rejection. Sort of.

4) Going through a rough patch financially? During the time frame covered by this book, my wife and I were $50,000 in debt. Two and a half years later, we’ve almost climbed out. And not by pursuing wealth, but by pursuing our passions. This book tells the story.

5) Feeling stuck in one of life’s semi-comfortable ruts? This book might just give you the motivation to hop on out and live a more effective life.

6) Feeling financially behind your peers? Read about a writer (me), and you’ll automatically feel like Donald Trump! (Wait, that might not be a great reason…keep reading.)

7) If you’ve been following our trip in a bus named Willie, and you want to get some back story on what brought us to the place where we would travel around the country for four months with our four young children, you’ll find some explanations in these virtual pages.

8) Enjoy all the free posts I put on my blog? Show your appreciation! Buy a copy of my new E-book!

9) Despise all the free posts I put on my blog? Buy a bunch of copies and convince your friends to do so as well. Then I’ll be a millionaire, inherit all kinds of problems, get sued by loads of people, and become too busy to blog. You could be solely responsible for the demise of my blogging career! Go for it!

10) If you take the few minutes required to put in your info and buy this book, it might teach you a small lesson about patience. When you’re in your car later today, this small lesson on patience might keep you from engaging an idiot driver with hand gestures and profanity. By refraining from this exchange, you won’t get shot by this stranger in a fit of road rage. Don’t get shot by a stranger in a fit of road rage – buy my book.

Enough already! You can purchase my book for your Nook, your Kindle, or you can go HERE and purchase the PDF version to read on your computer.

Thanks! I hope you find the courage to build your life out of whatever fulfills you.

What’s that? You say that not only do you want to buy it, you also want to help me spread the word? You ARE generous! In that case, click on the Facebook “Like” button at the bottom of the page and share it on your wall. Or click the Twitter button and share it with the hashtag #BuildingALife.

Saturday night we cruised north on I-75. The highway was a sea of red, and rain streaked the brake lights across the bus’s massive windshield in arcs and splashes. But the traffic charged forward, sweeping us along with it.

In the distance, the lights of Atlanta’s skyscrapers rose above the trees like the center of a newly formed galaxy.

The kids played in the back of the bus, long past their normal bed time. Maile sat beside me at the front of the bus, her feet up on the dash. We talked about how years change people. How life has made us a little more tired, a little more mature, a touch more cynical, a little less selfish.

Then we entered the city, the lights rising around us. It’s a fascinating feeling, driving through such tall buildings late on a rainy, Saturday night. The lights reflected off the wet highway, battered the windshield. Passing cars glared into my side view mirrors, then flashed past, making disgruntled sounds in the rain. When I opened the small sliding window beside the driver’s seat, the smell of wet, hot macadam rushed in to where we sat, filling the bus with summer.

Lightning flashed. Or was that a streetlight blinking out?

Then a quiet rustling through the curtain beside me. In the far reaches of my peripheral vision, out at the edge of a different galaxy, 2-year-old Sam had quietly walked to the front, pushed through the curtain that separates us from the back, and sat on the step beside my seat. He looked up through those huge pieces of glass, up through the rain, up at the forty-story office buildings with lights just blinking out.

Like a cricket in the forest looking up at the moon. Was there anything smaller than him in that entire city, looking up at its expanse? For a moment, he seemed like the center of it all.

Then, in a whisper, he said one word:

“Uh-mazing.”

A few of you were wondering what happened to the race organizer in the suit trying to chase down Kathrine Switzer at the Boston Marathon and rip off her race numbers because she was a woman and he didn’t want any women running in his race. Turns out, a huge dude body checked him. As an abbreviated Saturday post, (and since you all are such blood-thirsty, violent types) I thought I’d post the pics here for everyone to see.

Then there’s this shot:

I think these photos have a few lessons to offer us:

– Check out Kathrine Switzer’s determination. Ladies, she wasn’t giving up, and she wasn’t handing over her numbers. Keep that in mind, and keep running your own race, whatever it might be.

– Check out the small mob of supporters around her. These men were determined to help her finish her race. No matter how strong and determined an individual might be, everyone needs the support of other people from time to time. Are you willing to body check a race organizer for someone?

– Someone took these photos. I wish I could give a credit, but I just couldn’t figure out who took them. But the point is this: every story needs someone to chronicle it, or it will be forgotten. And when a story is forgotten, it might as well never have happened. If you’re a writer, or a photographer, or an artist, or a musician, or a teacher, or a human being: preserve the stories. Pass them on. Stories are one of the few weapons of power given to the weak and downtrodden, and storytellers can give gifts of significance to those viewed as lowly or insignificant by giving voice to their stories.

Stories can turn the world on its head.

Keep telling them.

* * * * *

For part one of “When a Woman Isn’t Allowed to Run the Race,” click HERE.

The small boy (me) stretches out on a worn sofa next to the man (my dad). He is watching television. The man wraps his arm around the skinny boy, protecting him from the world. In response, the boy asks the man a lot of questions, drowning out the evening news, but the man never shushes him like I (so often) shush my son when his life intersects with my own adult busy-ness.

Just a second, buddy.

Hold on a minute.

Let me just finish this up.

The little boy on the sofa asks the man (his father) the umpteenth question: “When you were a little kid like me, what did you want to be when you grew up?”

The man pauses, then speaks barely above a whisper.

“When I was a little boy, all I wanted to do was play baseball. That’s it.”

The man squeezes the boy a little closer, and the boy’s insides are crushed, not by the weight of the embrace, but by the realization that the man (his dad) had a dream that didn’t happen. Suddenly his house feels small and inconsequential, an indefensible structure in the face of a dream-squelching world.

But his father keeps hugging him, and eventually the small boy drifts off to sleep, and the weight of his dad’s arm is enough.

* * * * *

The small boy (my son) perches in Willie’s passenger seat during a five-hour trek into southern Georgia. He asks the driver (me) a million questions, and for the first time in too long the driver listens, and he answers every one.

“Did they have TVs when you were my age?” the small boy asks skeptically.

“Yes!” the driver protests, laughing. “I’m not that old!”

The small boy laughs mischievously.

“What was your favorite food when you were my age?” and “What were your four favorite sports, in order from one to four?” and “What did you like to do when you were a kid?”

Later the young boy would tell his mother, “I love sitting with Daddy at the front of the bus when he tells me about when he was a little boy.”

* * * * *

My dad sent me an email shortly after we left on our trip. In it he told me how he followed our big blue bus much further than I had realized, and how when he finally stopped he parked his car and watched us vanish into the traffic and over a hill and then we were gone. The things he said in the note made me feel like that boy again, lying beside his father on the sofa on a hot summer night, falling asleep as Dan Rather relayed events going on around the world. Events that were powerless in the face of his father’s love.

It’s a good feeling, when your father pays attention to you. I need to do that more, for all of my kids. Just stop and listen. And keep the world at bay for them.