Kim Rossi

Kim Stagliano, what's your secret?

A terrific autism Mom (Hello Knitty!) on the EOHarm list asked me that question this morning in reponse to a post where I mentioned that I run two blogs, (this one and www.rescuepost.com) have written a novel, write for Huffington Post, raise three girls with autism, am writing several pieces to submit to national media including NPR, and The Times (fingers crossed!) have a terrific, loving husband and manage to bathe daily while maintaining my sense of humor.

I thought about her question and the answer tumbled out of me. That's how my best writing comes about. In a cascade of passion. When I try to be clever or think about how to write a sentence I end up with dry toast crumbs on the page. BORING!

This was my response.

"Coffee. Chocolate. A sense of righteous indignation. A mother's love. A refusal to give in. A generally good state of mind. Enough catastrophes in our life to ground me. An insatiable need for money to help the kids. A lifelong ability to say "FU" to people who impede me. A refusal to fall prey to the message that I should be in dire mental straits, gobbling pills to get out of bed and another fistful to fall back to sleep. An innate fear of failure. A gut feeling that one day,everything will turn out all right for my girls. And all our kids. And then a bit more chocolate."

Now why didn't I print that in a book, call it "The Secret" and make a bazillion bucks?