Here's the post regarding the personal stuff about THREE CROSSES. First let me state that the reason I want to write this (even though it gets into my personal life more than I would normally want to share) is because I was talking to a business owner/friend/installer the other day at my regular job about THREE CROSSES. He asked me when did I write it and I told him the story. It was a story that moved him. I never really thought about it from his point of view and it's not a long story, but I thought that perhaps some of you would be interested in it as he was. Plus it willl give me an opportunity to say a few things that I have never really disclosed nor did I disclose to him the other day.
Many of you alreay know this story but don't know the connection between THREE CROSSES and the situation I am about to explain.
Again, I preface - THREE CROSSES actually developed some years ago. There were some details, but not a lot. One of the first details that arose was that Matt Madison was mauled to death by a tiger. Within weeks of making this discovery about my book, Roy of Siegfried and Roy was mauled by one of their tigers, which means this book was born somewhere around 2003(?). Out of respect to the illusionist-tiger tamer and because I was afraid that it would appear as if I was cashing in on a horrible situation, I put the book aside.
Occasionly I would think about it but I focused my writing on short stories and other novels. It brewed in the back of my mind but I wasn't ready yet. I will get into details in another post about writing COVET (which was a 5 1/2 week process) which played a pivotal role in my writing life. In late June 2009, my daughter, then 8 years old, complained to me that her back hurt. I thought that perhaps it was a result of riding her bike for 4 hours straight the night before (which is really cool because she and her neighbor friend were riding their bikes til midnight while the grownups all sat outside enjoying the beginning of summer vacation). After several days of her stating that her back still hurt and small doses of ibuprofen, I took her to her pediatricians office. I was to continue the anti-inflammatory doses and if things didn't improve in a week to come back. We came back and were immediately sent to Children's Hospital in Boston for x-rays. Now I am no x-ray technician, but I can assure you that as those pictures were developing, it was immediatley apparent that something was wrong with her spine. It looked as if a couple of her higher vertebrae (is that how you spell it - where is my spell check?) were collapsed. She had a significant crook in her spine. I don't know why but I immediately thought leukemia. Blood tests were ordered. Then we were sent to Milton Hospital where her PCP was working for the day. She saw us immediately and apparently leukemia had gone through the doctors' minds as well.
Sorry to tell this story in bits and pieces but I have a mess of things to conquer today and I would like to come back later. Til then, ciao:)
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