The below excerpt was taken from the book that I'm writing which is a prescriptive memoire.  This is the unedited version, but is something I hope to share with you all one day.   Please comment because it'll help me get a publisher.  :)  Enjoy.

~ Don’t deny a part of who you are.  It what makes you who you are, which you are also not. ~

It was 1980, in Idaho. 

Earlier that year Mount St. Helen’s blew up on my birthday, May 18th. I remember my grandma, mother, and I walking into the grocery store and my grandmother looked up and said “It’s really going to storm.” Boy was she right. For the next 40 years it would be quite a storm.

I was in the fourth grade. My best friend hurried to me, very distressed.  She ominously whispered, “It’s your turn.” 

We were in the middle of another boring recess. It was freezing cold, and I had a warm coat on with fake fur around the collar. I didn’t want to be outside. I didn’t like the cold. I preferred heat.

Obediently, I followed her a sho...