The Quiet Dawn When Searching for Faerie, Finding me Was Born

As I prepare to share the first part of the book Searching for Faerie, Finding Me, I feel deep gratitude — not only for the finished book, but for the first few lines that allowed the entire story to emerge. Before there was a complete story, illustrated pages, or a second edition, there were only a few words that came to me unexpectedly in the middle of the night. I still remember exactly where I was. It was around three o’clock in the morning, and I was working a private-duty night shift sitting with a patient at the end of his life. There was little for us to do medically except remain present, ensure comfort, and accompany him as he prepared to step behind the curtain separating this life from whatever comes next. The nights were long and quiet and in the morning, the darkness would soften into morning light outside the window.

Each morning, as dawn began to break, he would open his eyes and look toward the window. Sometimes, he expressed exasperation because he was tired of “lingering”. But I looked at the brightening sky differently. I felt relief every morning that he survived the night. Although his body was failing, I felt that he still had a lot of stories to tell me. Somewhere in those quiet hours, the first lines of Faerie came to me. I had thought about the beginning of the story before, but during those nights, the words finally found their way on paper. Once the first few lines appeared, more followed. The story seemed to recognize an opening and began telling me its heart. Within the week, my patient took his final breath. Afterward, while I waited for my next private-duty assignment, I continued writing. The words that had begun beside his deathbed grew into pages, and those pages eventually became the first third of the book. Looking back, I am struck by the way one ending quietly made room for a beginning.

The story of Faerie was born while a tired spirit was saying goodbye to this life. It began in the stillness of the night, and born in the soft light of the final dawn. It is because of this start that the story evolved with themes of searching, loss, hope, and finding light in unexpected places. I am sharing this first portion of the book now as a way of returning to its beginning. Also to express my gratitude to the early version of the story—the imperfect text, the first illustrations, and those hesitant, halting first few lines.

At this time, I did not know where the pages were going to lead me. But I trusted that they came for a reason. And the words came, and because they came, more words followed. The characters appeared. The world expanded and the story revealed itself one page at a time. Eventually, there was a whole book, and now there is an enhanced version of that book waiting to be born. So, as I share the first part of the making of Searching for Faerie, I am not only introducing the beginning of a story. I am honoring the quiet moment in which it first arrived. I am thanking the first words for having the courage to appear. I am thanking the book for allowing me to create it. And I am remembering that sometimes, while we sit beside an ending, a new beginning is already waiting quietly in the dawn.

https://youtu.be/uTvP2PUIprs?si=B2h6LezDTO0tSEJ0