My Top Stories

Not too long ago, I took a few weeks off from writing. I felt like I had no inspiration. I would stare at the blank screen or page and nothing. So, instead of trying to force it, I took some time off from writing.

The first piece I wrote after my break was for the #200 challenge, and it helped me set some attainable goals for the next year on Vocal. I wondered if I would be able to create good content again. I have had quite a few new subscribers as of late, so there was a little extra pressure. A friend of mine, who is also a writer, suggested I look through my work and review my best work. So that is what this is—a recap of my Top Stories on Vocal.

Conversations With My New Friend Oneg

This is my first Top Story with Vocal. It was a fun piece to do as well. A Facebook group I was in posed an unofficial challenge: Not My Shoes interviews. People got paired up, and it was an exercise for us to get to know people better. I got paired with Oneg (Oneg In The Arctic on Vocal). Oneg is an interesting person, and we still chat today. Did you know that Oneg lives on a First Nation reservation? It's a small Ojibway community in the middle of Canada's Bush (forests). Read more of our interview below.

Phone Calls With Mom

I wrote this when COVID was still keeping us separate. My mom was high risk because of her COPD. I wanted her to know how much I appreciated her and how much our daily conversations meant to me. She did read it, and we did have the discussion I mentioned at the end of this piece. Now that my mother is gone, this piece has a special place in my heart.

Silence

This piece is a poem I wrote for the Vocal Tautogram challenge, where every word starts with the same letter. I am pleased with how this turned out, and this received Top Story, though I did not place in the challenge.

Hospice Came Today

Hospice Came Today is another piece written about my mom. I wrote this after the doctors told us that she wasn't responding to treatment and there was nothing more they could do. She came home on hospice care, where my sister and I took care of her until she passed five weeks later, at home surrounded by her children.

Introducing Araina the Spirit Medium

This was a fun interview to do. Araina is a long-time friend and a very gifted medium. She is also one of the kindest and most compassionate people I know. It is a fascinating read about being a medium and what comes next.

The Art of Love

The Art of Love is probably my favorite of my Top Stories. It was for the painted prose challenge. I took a different route and selected to write about a piece of art my youngest child (fifteen now) painted for me. It is a picture of my husband and me in front of a rainbow backdrop, with a banner along the bottom that says "Dads".

Good Grief Part One

Good Grief Part One was born out of doing my own research to help me get through the grief of losing my mother. While writing this piece, much research went into it, and I learned so much about the grieving process.

A Broken Hero

A Broken Hero was a tough piece to write. It is my dad's story, including the good and bad times. He was a force of nature, and good and bad, he made his mark in this world and left a big void for those of us left behind.

Introducing Queer Vocal Voices

This piece was exciting for me. I, along with two other Vocal creators, Oneg and River, started a group specifically for queer voices on Vocal. We noticed the number of creators and stories in the PRIDE community was lower than expected. So with a group specifically for queer creators, we are trying to foster a safe place for queer creators to be heard. Hopefully, that translates into more creators and stories in the PRIDE community.

Hide and Seek

This piece is probably the most personal piece I have written. This is my story on accepting myself for who I am, and my eventual coming out.

Thank you for reading my work! I appreciate all of the support, reads, likes and comments I have received over the almost three years I have been on Vocal.