Bookstagram Made Me Do It. My New Writing Prompt Book...

I bought another book of writing prompts because #bookstagrammademedoit.

It’s SOOOOO pretty. Burn After Writing by Sharon Jones.

Here's a question I answered last night.

The first thing I bought w/my own money:

I saw the ring when I was 16, at Grace Brother's Antiques. It was a lot of money. An impossible amount of money for a 16-year-old. An antique engagement ring with a wedding band. It had already been resized and was the first piece of vintage jewelry I'd ever tried on that had ever fit my large man-hands.

It took me over a year working at American Eagle (for minimum wage) to pay for it. But all I can tell you is that as soon as I saw it, I knew I had to have it.

Sure, it was expensive. I had a perfect idea of how many hrs it would take me to buy it. A clear understanding of the other things I could have bought with the same money. It might not be the first thing I bought with my own funds, but damn, it was the first thing I had to really struggle to buy. But I worked out a payment plan with the men who owned the store (loveliest couple EVER). I brought bagged lunches to school, worked nights & weekends, didn't spend on anything else (apart from a VERY modest book budget).

Looking back, I know it was an insane thing to do. But now I kinda get it. In case you're new to my feed (I've written about this a bit in my newsletter / on IG), I survived a series of brain tumors in my adolescence. 3 surgeries before I turned 19, it was a hell of a coming of age.

Maybe the ring was something grown-up I could have at that moment. Maybe I worried no guy would ever buy me a ring (I had still never been kissed at this point, but I was well practiced at pretending I didn't care). Maybe it was being the scholarship student at a boarding school where my friends received the price tag as a weekly allowance. In any case, the journey to get that ring was worth it.

Now, on intl woman’s day… I still have no regrets. Go buy your ring. Do you.

Ellie Sharpe, my 1st heroine (Nearly Wed: Does A Twin By Any Other Name Taste As Sweet?), is also a brain cancer survivor. A lot of people ask me if I wrote Ellie in my own reflection, but I always identified more w/Jenny Dune (heroine of Nearly Late: Sometimes I'm Sorry Isn't Enough, who yes, has also survived Brain cancer- for my first books, I wanted to base some of the character development on what I knew!). But still, there is something about Ellie I will always connect with.

Now for the plug: Nearly Wed is on #KU... go & check it out xx

Your turn. What was the first important purchase you ever made?

#Fulldisclosure, I might use it in a book.