Reboot Your Life Read online

  Contents

  Introduction, Claire Cook

  ~Do It Now~

  1. Must Love Midlife, Claire Cook

  2. Conquering the Giant of Provence, Dawn A. Marcus

  3. Life Launch, Kristi Paxton

  4. Following My Nephew’s Dream, David Cranmer

  5. A Risky Jump, Sioux Roslawski

  6. Winters of Solace, Heather Zuber-Harshman

  7. Just in Time, P. Avice Carr

  8. The Dry Truth, Kathy Whirity

  9. A Family Reunion, Peter W. Wood

  ~Follow Your Heart~

  10. Run for Your Life, Dean Karnazes

  11. Finding “Perfect Love”, Shari Hall

  12. Mobilized by Fear, Andrew E. Kaufman

  13. Time of Possession, James C. Magruder

  14. Happiness Is a Big Loud Garbage Truck, Roz Warren

  15. Movie Critic, MD, Tanya Feke

  16. Becoming Real, Amy L. Stout

  17. A New Operating System, Sabrina Zackery

  18. Self-Discovery, Val Jones

  19. There Are Writers in There, Shawnelle Eliasen

  ~Take a Chance~

  20. A Real Stretch, Rebecca Olker

  21. From Corporate to Carrots, Kamia Taylor

  22. 365 Envelopes, Karen Martin

  23. Jumping Fences, Arlene Ledbetter

  24. Laying Myself Off, Sharron Carrns

  25. The Life of the Party, Giulietta Nardone

  26. Safely Stuck in a Rut, Tanya Rusheon

  27. The Tuesday Night Ladies League, Pat Wahler

  28. Moments of Clarity, Erin Latimer

  29. Moving to Hong Kong, MaryLou Driedger

  30. Running Away to Join the Circus, Denise Reich

  ~Find Your Purpose~

  31. What’s Your Story? Amy Newmark

  32. Making a Difference, Lisa Morris

  33. Finding My Happiness, Brenda Lazzaro Yoder

  34. A Happiness Throttle, Alli Page

  35. Lost and Found, Marijo Herndon

  36. Restaurant Epiphany, Robert J. Brake

  37. Family of Rejects, Sylvia Ney

  38. The Confidence to Change, Angela Ogburn

  39. Unexpected Changes, Jane Lonnqvist

  40. Express Yourself, Jan Bono

  ~Start Over~

  41. A New Model, Jennifer Sky

  42. A Long Walk, Christopher Clark

  43. I Should Thank Him, Heather Ray

  44. The Adventure of Starting Over, Patricia Lorenz

  45. Rewriting My Story, Deborah K. Wood

  46. Finding Me at Fifty, Liz Maxwell Forbes

  47. The Power of Positive Pigheadedness, Lynn Kinnaman

  48. Doors Wide Open, Jennifer Chauhan

  49. Never Too Old, Kay Thomann

  50. Laid Off and Living the Dream, Sean Marshall

  51. Meeting Mom, Katherine Higgs-Coulthard

  ~Mind Your Health~

  52. Who Would Have Thought? Esther Clark

  53. Back in the Saddle Again, Jennie Ivey

  54. No Smoking, Elizabeth Smayda

  55. A Kick in the Keister, B.J. Taylor

  56. Made to Order? Marsha Porter

  57. Running for My Life, Melissa Face

  58. My Big Wake-Up Call, Lori Lara

  59. The Comeback, Brian Teason

  60. How I Became a Muddy Girl, Maggi Normile

  ~Overcome Adversity~

  61. From Homeless to Happy, Kamia Taylor

  62. Jersey Shore Promises, Theresa Sanders

  63. The Café de l’Espérance, Cherie Magnus

  64. Finding Hope after Despair, Debra Wallace Forman

  65. The Joy I Choose to See, Janet Perez Eckles

  66. Mirror, Mirror, Sara Etgen-Baker

  67. Life Reignited, Jessie Wagoner

  68. A Long Hard Fight, Jeanette Rubin

  69. Two Sisters, Ann Michener Winter

  ~Listen to Your Friends~

  70. The Year of Exploration, Nicole K. Ross

  71. How Running Helped Me Heal, Kristin Julie Viola

  72. A Journey of a Lifetime, Stacy Ross

  73. What Would You Do? Jaime Schreiner

  74. Starting All Over, Jay H. Berman

  75. Gratitude, Schmatitude, Susan A. Karas

  76. I Think I Can, Tyler Stocks

  77. Dear Daddy, Paul Bowling II

  78. Nose to the Wall, Garrett Bauman

  ~Take Time for You~

  79. Doing Nothing Perfectly, Ferida Wolff

  80. Annual Reboot, Connie Rosser Riddle

  81. Awakened by the Creator Within, Christine Burke

  82. My Writing Roller Coaster, Lisa McManus Lange

  83. Clean Start, Pam Bailes

  84. One Year of Celibacy, Shannon Kaiser

  85. Back to School, Angela Joseph

  86. A Happy Heart, Terri Elders

  87. Second Chance, J.C. Andrew

  88. Dancing with a Cane on My Head, Sue Mannering

  ~Adjust Your Attitude~

  89. Eight Thousand Miles, Carol Strazer

  90. Forgiveness and Freedom, Nancy Julien Kopp

  91. Steady the Course, Eloise Elaine Ernst Schneider

  92. The Bedtime Ritual that Changed My Life, Dallas Woodburn

  93. Best Day Ever, Dorann Weber

  94. Picture This, Carol Ayer

  95. All Things New, Kathleen Kohler

  96. The Relationship Dance, Chris Jahrman

  97. Just Drive Warrior, Diana Lynn

  98. Pickles, Fallon Kane

  99. My Perfect Imperfect Life, Marilyn Boone

  100. The Stay-at-Home Mom, L.A. Strucke

  101. Thriving, Lynn Dove

  Afterword, Amy Newmark

  Meet Our Contributors

  Meet Our Authors

  Thank You

  About Chicken Soup for the Soul

  Share with Us

  Changing the world one story at a time ®

  www.chickensoup.com

  Introduction

  I’m thrilled to be a part of Chicken Soup for the Soul: Reboot Your Life. I loved immersing myself in all 101 of the fabulous stories you’re about to read, and it was a joy and an honor to be asked to write a story myself.

  I was so inspired by these brave and thoughtful men and women — who all feel like new friends now — and I know you’ll be inspired by them, too. What struck me most in their stories is that we can bury our dreams for years, even decades, but they still linger beneath the surface and never really go away. I knew this from my own personal experience, but to see it multiplied by one hundred is incredibly powerful.

  So, bravo to every one of these contributors, who took long, hard looks at their existing lives, realized they were stuck, and had the courage and the tenacity to change them into the lives they’d dreamed about.

  You’ll hear about M. Sean Marshall’s awesome wife, who helped him celebrate his layoff and turn it into an amazing adventure.

  You’ll cheer on Kamia Taylor as she fights her way back from homelessness.

  Fallon Kane will share the lessons she learned working in a pickle shop.

  You’ll walk along with Heather Clausen as she gets herself back in shape.

  You’ll be glad it was Rebecca Olker, and not you, who found herself at a writing retreat where the participants were naked.

  You’ll go belly dancing with Sue Mannering.

  You’ll learn how to change your negative thoughts to their opposite along with Carol Strazer.

  You’ll go to Paris with Cherie Magnus, Hong Kong with MaryLou Driedger, and South Africa with Christopher Clark.

  And you’ll read my story about finally writing my first novel in my minivan when I was forty-five and, at fifty, walking the red carpet at the Hollywood premi
ere of the adaptation of my second novel, Must Love Dogs, starring Diane Lane and John Cusack.

  If you’re feeling stuck in your own life, if you find yourself whining about the cards you’ve been dealt and pointing fingers at everyone but yourself, this is the book for you. Not only will you feel less alone as you hear from people who were once standing right where you are now, but you’ll find the motivation you need to take the plunge and create a better life, and you’ll learn some practical strategies for getting there.

  What are you waiting for? Enjoy!

  ~Claire Cook,

  bestselling author of Must Love Dogs and Never Too Late

  Do It Now

  Must Love Midlife

  It’s never too late to be what you might have been.

  ~George Eliot

  The Hollywood premiere of the Must Love Dogs movie was held at the mammoth Cinerama Dome on Sunset Boulevard. I was the author of the novel it was based on. I was thrilled that, because my name was on the movie poster, I was entitled to four tickets to the premiere, which meant my husband and two kids and I could all go. We were even given a suite at the Hollywood Roosevelt.

  I had no expectations, other than thinking it would be fun and we’d probably get free popcorn. I remember wandering Hollywood Boulevard early that afternoon with my daughter, poking around in all the tourist shops. I bought a knock-off Gucci bag shaped like a dog and a pink feather boa collar to clip around its neck, and decided it would be only fitting to carry a copy of the book to the premiere in it. Clearly I was thinking like a tourist rather than an author whose movie adaptation was about to premiere in a few hours, since I also bought a refrigerator magnet with a picture of the Hollywood sign on it.

  By that point I’d heard premiere stories from other authors. The one that stuck in my head was from an author whose name must not have been on the movie poster because he only got two tickets to the premiere. He brought his mother. The day came and they pulled up to the red carpet. The limo driver rolled down the window and gave his passenger’s name and said he was the author.

  As the driver got out to open the doors for the author and his mother, the event publicist leaned into her microphone. She announced his name and told the long line of media people standing behind the ropes on the edge of the red carpet that he was the author.

  “Nah, we don’t want him,” a television reporter standing with his cameraman said loudly. Everybody else in the long line concurred with a headshake or a brush of their hand, or just ignored the announcement entirely. The author and his mother slunk along the length of the red carpet as quickly as they could and disappeared into the theater.

  I’d warned my family what to expect and I wasn’t really worried about it. I mostly wanted to watch the movie. Gary David Goldberg, the movie’s producer/director, had shared every draft of the script, as well as a few short promo clips, but he hadn’t wanted me to watch the whole thing until tonight.

  It was early on a hot summer night and the sun was still relentless. Our stretch limo pulled up. The driver lowered his window, gave my name and said I was the author. He opened our doors and the event person announced me. I got ready to be ignored.

  Well, it turned out that not only had the actors not arrived yet, but unbeknownst to me, one of the Boston affiliates had asked Access Hollywood, which aired on the same network, to get some footage of me for them to show on the local news that night.

  “We want her!” the crew from Access Hollywood yelled.

  And because Access Hollywood wanted me, Entertainment Tonight yelled, “We want her!”

  And then Xtra wanted me. And then everybody in the whole media line wanted me. The event publicist started escorting me toward the line. “How do you feel about director Gary David Goldberg changing Mother Teresa, the St. Bernard in the book, to a Newfoundland in the movie?” a reporter yelled.

  “I would have been fine with a possum,” I yelled back.

  And so I walked along the red carpet, which was actually a dogthemed green faux-grass carpet dotted with fire hydrants, taking questions from the media line. After I finished chatting with the big outlets, the event person pulled me aside and whispered that I’d done the important ones, so I could stop now if I wanted to.

  “Are you kidding me?” I said. I talked to every single one of them, including the guy from a radio station in, I think, Singapore at the very end of the line. I did thirty-five interviews on that green carpet. The paparazzi were even yelling “Claire, Claire” and taking my picture when I looked. At one point I remember asking a group of them if they were really the paparazzi because they seemed so much nicer in person than I’d heard they were.

  And the next morning I awoke to find out there was a picture of me, holding up my knock-off dog purse with a copy of Must Love Dogs peeking out, on the front page of The Hollywood Reporter. And in an AP piece that was picked up by hundreds and hundreds of publications, Michael Cidoni wrote that in his twenty-five years of covering Hollywood premieres, he had never seen an author have as much fun at a premiere as Claire Cook. And of course, “Must Love Dogs author Claire Cook says she would have been fine with a possum!” was just about everywhere.

  This was the year I turned fifty, which in Hollywood years I’m pretty sure is at least eighty-two. My green carpet media blitz was a total long shot, and I was not in any way prepared for it or expecting it to happen. A minute or two later one of the actors — Diane Lane, John Cusack, Christopher Plummer, Elizabeth Perkins, Stockard Channing — could have arrived and the media would have dropped me in a Hollywood minute. But in this tiny window was a colossal opportunity to get the word out about my books, and when that happens, you’ve just got to go for it.

  Eventually my long-suffering family and I made it inside the theater. And I was right — not only did we get free popcorn but also free soda, both delivered to us by handsome tuxedo-clad waiters. We were even seated in the front row of the first balcony, with the actors surrounding us.

  Way down below, in front of the movie screen, Gary stood up to speak.

  “None of us would be here tonight,” he began, “without Claire Cook and her wonderful novel. I started out as a fan of her work, and we quickly became personal friends, and I now consider her one of the few people in the world I can always count on for the truth presented in the kindest way possible.”

  Behind me, some of the actors hooted. Dermot Mulroney caught my eye and gave me a thumbs-up. I was stunned. I was overwhelmed. It was one of the most beautiful moments of my life.

  Just over five years before that, I’d been sitting with a group of swim moms (and a few good dads) at 5:30 A.M. My daughter was swimming back and forth and back and forth on the other side of a huge glass window during the first of two daily practices that bracketed her school day and my workday as a teacher.

  The parental conversation in the wee hours of that morning, as we sat bleary-eyed, cradling our Styrofoam cups of coffee and watching our kids, was all about training and form and speed, who was coming on at the perfect time, who was in danger of peaking before championships, even who just might have a shot at Olympic trial times.

  In my mind, I stepped back and listened. Whoa, I thought, we really need to get a life.

  And right at that moment it hit me with the force of a poolside tidal wave that I was the one who needed to get a life. A new one, the one I’d meant to have all along. I was not getting any younger, and I was in serious danger of living out my days without ever once going for it. Without even trying to achieve my lifelong dream of writing a novel. Suddenly, not writing a book became more painful than pushing past all that fear and procrastination and actually writing it.

  So, for the next six months, through one long cold New England winter and into the spring, I wrote a draft of my first novel, sitting in my minivan outside my daughter’s swim practice. It sold to the first publisher who asked to read it. Lots of terrific books by talented authors take a long time to sell, so maybe I got lucky. I’ve also considered that perhaps if
you procrastinate as long as I did, you get to skip some of the awful stages on the path to wherever it is you’re going and just cut to the chase.

  But another way to look at it is that there were only three things standing in my way all those years: me, myself and I.

  My first novel was published when I was forty-five. Not only did I walk the red carpet at the Hollywood premiere of the movie adaptation of Must Love Dogs at fifty, but I’m now an actual bestselling author of eleven novels, as well as my first nonfiction book about reinvention, Never Too Late. Not many days go by that I don’t take a deep breath and remind myself that this is the career I almost didn’t have.

  Anything can happen. It is never, ever too late.

  ~Claire Cook

  Conquering the Giant of Provence

  The road leading to a goal does not separate you from the destination; it is essentially a part of it.

  ~Charles de Lint

  “I do.” Those simple words, spoken amid smiles and tears on a warm June afternoon changed my life. No, this was not my wedding. My husband and I had already been happily married for twenty-eight years and had settled into a comfortable empty nester life with our two Terriers. We enjoyed hikes in the woods and had just started a new hobby identifying wildflowers. We’d also grown comfortable with the twenty-five extra pounds we’d put on, which didn’t interfere with photographing flowers.

  The wedding couple was in their twenties. We knew their families, but no one else at the reception. We selected a table with two other couples and introduced ourselves. The husbands were fraternity brothers who got together yearly to keep their friendship alive.

  During the entrée and dessert, they shared plans for a bicycling trip through Provence, in southern France, starting Labor Day. The trip accommodated different levels of cyclists, although the big event would be a climb up Mont Ventoux, known as the “Giant of Provence,” which is a highlight of the Tour de France. There’d be lunches at vineyards, overnights in old castles, and great food. The more they talked, the more enthusiastic we became. Several glasses of wine later, my husband and I were hooked.