I need your guts.

Ladies.

Gentlemen.

I need your gut instincts, your intuition, your introspection on a subject that keeps coming up for me.

A Note from Editor-in-Pink, Melanie Bates:

I've never been more in love. Since I was a tiny tot I've been an organizational freak and used to line up all my patent leather Mary Janes with level precision so that I could hide crackers and Halloween treats in them. My shoes are still lined up, though I now keep the crackers in the cupboard and the Halloween candy has its own drawer, so when I saw this 2012 Declutter and Organize Calendar on mysimplerlife.com I nearly passed out with joy.

I’ve been writing a novel since the beginning of time. Okay, perhaps that’s a slight exaggeration, but it sure feels like it. In actuality, I started it in 1999 or 2000 and have been working on it, on and off, for twelve years or so. It’s all kinda fuzzy.

And I’m only about 160 pages in, so take my advice with a single molecule of salt.

This isn’t going to be very funny, or witty, or humorous, my friends, but I still think you’ll relate to my son-of-a-bitch of an inner critic.  In fact, I daresay you have one too - possibly a bit less crass, a bit nicer, but you’ve got one nonetheless.

I’m heading in to surgery the day before my 41st birthday.  While finishing up my last semester of college I found a lump in my throat which I blatantly ignored as I studied for finals, wrote my senior thesis, and waited on the edge of my seat to find out if my Valedictorian nomination would mean I had to give a speech to thousands of kids, twenty-some years younger than I, wearing green gowns and caps with yellow tassels.