When my daughter was almost ten years old, I took her with me to work after lunch and had her sit in the car while I put on my cleaning uniform. I was a janitor cleaning two, eighteen story buildings and had no one to look after her so this was done out of necessity.

While getting ready, I asked her: “Do you know what Daddy is about to do?”

She said “Yes, this is your fake job.”

“And what’s my real job.”

“You want to be a writer.”

I’ve told this story before, but it has stayed with me over a decade later. My daughter wrote a piece in high school where she retold that story and when her teacher shared it with me, I couldn’t be more proud.

I, like so many of us, have sacrificed a lot to chase this author dream. I dropped out of high school (eventually graduated), lived through making zero dollars for several months, cried, screamed, doubted myself and fought for this.

Now I’m living it and it feels so beautiful to reflect on where I came from and what I went through to get here.