I See What You Meme

It is 12:30 AM and I am still so wired I can't sleep. The book release party was a-MAZE-ing.  Where do I begin? Me...in book signing mode! First of all, Roger and my best friend Jamie conspired to surprise me and they succeeded!  Jamie is my oldest and one of my dearest friends .  She also happens to be the photographer who took the cover photo for Four Seasons for Charlotte .  When I told her about the date for the book release party, I realized that she probably wouldn't be able to attend.  She does, after all, live in Florida. For the last few weeks, she has been sending me messages of congratulations, telling me how sorry she was that she couldn't make it.  I promised to send her one of the first copies.  What I didn't know was that she was working with Roger to visit this weekend.  She showed up at the book signing and totally made my day.  Getting to spend the last few hours just chatting with an old friend: Priceless.  I ...

My grief journey has afforded me an opportunity for very interesting interactions with people.  One of the topics I discuss in Four Seasons for Charlotte   revolves around the idea of saying the right thing  or doing the right thing  when you try to support a person in crisis.  With that in mind, I wanted to share two very interesting interactions I had with relative strangers in the past two weeks.  Ever since Charlotte's death, I have braced myself for that inevitable question : Do you have any children? The question (and subsequent answers) take many forms, depending on the circumstances.  Sometimes I actually bring up the topic of Charlotte's life (and death) on my own.  Sometimes I wait for others to initiate.   Two weeks ago, I was expanding my knowledge of leadership in a Nonprofit Learning Point class.  During the lunch break, the conversation turned to a book I was reading and somehow the topic shifted to my own book releas...