My life as has been very strange of late. This past year has seen many changes, good and bad. My mother passed away in May and then I had a mini-stroke in January as well as a car accident. I thank God everyday that I am still alive through all the stress and drama that had happened through it all. Like the phoenix I have come to see that there has to be pain in order to grow, there has to be a burning within to be more in order for a rebirth to take place. I still don't quite understand what it is I am becoming, but I do know what I am not the same as I was before. I know that when the flames of my life had threatened to consume me there was not death but a transition in my life. This transition is a journey to  becoming a person who takes charge of her life and doesn't let any opportunity go to waste. I am not fully there yet but I'm trying to understand the new me, and I think she is someone that is being made whole by brokeness, and it's made me eternally grateful and humbled.
  My newest novel was inspired by this years trials by fire, the beginning I will share with you now.

    It was a cold winter, and Merrow didn’t want to be out in it longer than she had to be. Her thin coat was a gift given out of love, but it wasn’t as warm. The bright torches led her way through the moist caves as they made the dust within the walls sparkle like the diamonds she had seen up in the sky. The cave seemed to go on forever, and that only fed Merrow’s fear. She didn’t know why she had to come here, this forbidden place. All she did know was that you didn’t ignore a dying wish, especially from an elder. The light ahead became warmer and brighter as she walked. A smile crossed her face, Merrow was only ten, but that was old enough to know that warmth kept them alive in winters like this. The opening widened and there were places made for sitting cut of the rocks all around a large fire that came from the very depths of the earth.
“Your footsteps are loud. Do you have nothing to hide child?”
Merrow recognized this man, he used to lead them many moons ago. It took her breath away to know that a man who had been dead since before she had ever been thought of was here, and talking to her. Donn didn’t look like a ghost to Merrow. She couldn’t see through him, and there was dirt over his shaggy black hair and beard. His leather winter wraps that protected him from the cold looked solid enough for her to reach out and touch it. Merrow stayed where she was, taking slow and careful breaths.
“No, there is nothing left for me to lose,” Merrow said, standing tall, her shoulders rigid. Her fear didn’t show, which she was glad of. It was only her pride that gave her away.
“What are you doing here?” Donn asked, and his voice was so calm that it made Merrow even more wary. A man like Donn being calm meant that he didn’t fear that she saw him because he knew she wasn’t getting out alive.
“I came on behalf of Elder Sirul. She told me to come here once her body was laid to rest.”
Donn smiled, slow and careful, as if he found this to be some kind of amusing taunt.
“She sent you? Well, this should be interesting. Do you even know why you’re here?”
Still standing as tall as a ten year old could, Merrow shook her head. “No, she said I would know when I got here. But she must have been mistaken.”
Donn laughed, and it filled the entire cavern so deeply that she covered her ears. Merrow was afraid that Donn was going to bring the cavern down on top of them with a laugh of all things. Miraculously not even a single rock moved out of place. Donn looked at Merrow now with interest.
“If she sent you, then you have no idea just how mistaken,” he replied and then walked closer to her, his boots not making a sound on the stone.
“If you know why Sirul sent me then tell me, or let me be on my way,” Merrow said, glaring at Donn for his mockery.
“There are two reasons that come to mind. You are here to either pick up the mantle of our power, or to die trying. Are you afraid of death?”
Merrow didn’t answer right away, her eyes narrowing in thought. She stepped closer to Donn and lowered her hood that had been covering her delicate face.
“No, I’m not afraid.”
Donn grinned, and then offered his hand to Merrow. The young girl hesitated for a moment, and then reached out and grasped the man’s gloved hand. Even through the glove Merrow could feel the cold resonating from his hand. It was like having her hand drenched with ice water, and made her think that perhaps Donn was a ghost after all.
“What do I have to do?” Merrow asked, her youth showing in her large eyes, looking at Donn as a student would a teacher. Donn’s smile turned down slightly around the mouth and his cold hand squeezed hers.
“You walk through the fire.”
Merrow stopped in her tracks as she looked at the extremely hot fire in front of them. The flames twisted up through the top of cavern like a burning twister.
“You wouldn’t be the first to lose their nerve,” Donn said, but there was sympathy in his tone. The girl let her long dirty blonde hair out of its braid and took a breath.
“Sirul would want me to follow this through to the end.”
Donn nodded and then led her closer to the fire. “I can’t follow you, it wasn’t meant for me.”

Merrow swallowed and then looked over to the only person who would know what happened to her if this went badly. She wanted to tell him to not let her be forgotten. She wanted to say why she was doing this but knew he wouldn’t really care about any of that. With her head held high Merrow stepped back into the inferno as her scream filled the cave.

  As a close to this very long post I want to say if you are feeling hopeless, know that perhaps it is in this state where you will become the most strongest version of yourself and rise stronger like steel from the hot forge that couldn't be broken by the hammer, only bent to perfection.