YA Series and Chill: Traits of a Heroine

A few weeks ago, I purchased a lovely bracelet from a friend whose upcycling skills I have serious admiration for. She can make things that nobody wants—dingy, used, forgotten, unloved things—into beautiful treasures.

My bracelet is a leather cuff with an antique brass plate that reads, "Stronger than yesterday."

When I saw it, I knew I wanted it. I just wasn't exactly sure why.

But with the launch of Life after Juliet, and all the reflecting I've done on Becca Hanson and the journey we took to write her story, I think I know what compelled me to purchase the bracelet.

Stronger than yesterday is a mantra. And for those who travel life's paths with grief in their hearts, it's an important mantra. 

Grief strikes everyone differently. It often comes hand-in-hand with mental illnesses like depression and anxiety, diseases that poison our minds to make us feel like we're weak or worthless. Diseases that make us feel like we can never be strong again (Because what's the point? That's Depression tossing in her two stupid cents).

There are many ways to deal with grief. Some are admittedly healthier than others, but I'm in no place to judge. Eventually, when you learn to live with your grief and accept it, you'll feel strong—it'll make you stronger than you were yesterday and the day before and the day before. Stronger. Different. Never the same. But stronger.

What makes Becca Hanson heroic is her will to wake each day, get out of bed, and carry on. Which isn't to say that she's anything less than heroic on the days she can't get out of bed. Those days are okay, too. Those days are necessary. Those days will happen. But eventually, she's going to get out of bed. And eventually, she'll remind herself that she's strong, stronger with each day she thrives in this world.

Becca Hanson is a hero because she could have regressed back into the safe world she'd created for herself in the pages of her books. That could have been her path, but I don't think that path would have allowed her to meet her grief. I think that regression was a way of avoiding it.

Instead, she chose to try—and in some cases fail at—new things as a means of learning to live again with this new appendage of grief. 

If that's not heroic, then I don't know what a hero is. 

"You rarely win, but sometimes you do." ~Atticus Finch, To Kill a Mockingbird