After weeks and months of harrassing my husband with questions and ‘what if’ situations, I finally listened to him tonight. It may be the first time. It may be the only time. But that is how it goes when you are always right.


Tonight I started writing my cookbook proposal. Tonight I started pouring stories of Mother Lovett out on paper, for the first time other than on my blog. For those of you who don’t know, Mother Lovett was blind as a bat, legally deaf, stubborn as all hell, and baked a fabulous cake. She left us this past April, almost one year ago.


For a few months, I have been tossing around the idea of writing a cookbook chock-full of not only her recipes, but her stories. Her stories of strength, stubbornness, and vitality. Her stories of marrying her dead husband’s brother, and being most excited that she didn’t need to change her last name. Her stories of fondling every shrimp on the shrimp cocktail platter, before choosing the one she found to be most worthy. Her stories of scooting down the grocery store aisle, pushing her cart and wondering out loud if the maxi-pads in her cart had wings.


And do you know what I’ve learned so far? It is hard. It is freakin‘ hard.

Not writing about her. That comes easily. She provided us with 88 years of laugh-out-loud tales, and sometimes I don’t even know where to begin.


But writing this cookbook proposal is hard.


I do not possess patience. Patience isn’t even in my vocabulary. A victim of the internet generation, I want everything now, and yesterday would have been even better.


I debated talking about it on the blog. I’ve talked myself out of it time and time again. In fact, all I find myself doing is talking to myself. I think my husband is about to have me committed.

What if I jinx myself?

What credentials do I have?

Will people wonder, ‘who does she think she is?’

Am I even a good writer?!?!?

I’m setting myself up for failure.

I’ve never written a professional or published article in my life – I’m insane!


I’ve been over and over and over this in my head for months. I’ve been driving my husband crazy, constantly asking him questions. I keep asking myself ‘should I do this? Am I setting myself up for failure? Am I going to embarrass myself by publicly writing about?’


I finally realized – I want to be that person that does it. I don’t want to talk about it constantly, analyzing the situation and telling myself I’ll start next week. The fact is – I have nothing else to do. There is nothing else in this world that I want to do more. If I don’t do this, I will be lost.


I want to be a do-er. I don’t want to be a talker.


A huge (read: HUGE!) part of me is scared that I am jinxing myself. What if I write about it and it never happens? I expect to be rejected, but what if I am forever rejected? Will people laugh at me?


I’ve decided that it just can’t be a possibility. I’m going to do what I want to do, and work until it gets done. If I want to be successful, I need to put myself out there.


So tonight, I started the book proposal. I can’t believe I’m putting myself out there. I can’t believe I’m WRITING IT DOWN. And even though I don’t have a book deal, and may never ever have a book deal, I really need to thank you all. I would have never had the idea, courage, knowledge, or passion to do this if I hadn’t started blogging. And I certainly never would have started something like this without the overwhelming, amazing outreach that I have received from all of you.


Out of all the lessons Mother Lovett has taught me – from baking, to loving, to never giving up; from using expired dairy products to finding stool softener in the grocery store – I never would have thought she would be teaching me patience.