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by Adriana Locke | Jun 6, 2017 | 0 comments

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My mother passed away before dawn yesterday morning.
I was beside her bed, surrounded by my aunts and cousins, and held her hand as she peacefully made her way to the other side.
I got to her house on Monday. Since then, it's been full of family and friends, food and laughter. My aunts and cousins have stayed with me in her room twenty-four hours a day (more-or-less) the entire week. We've told stories, played music, sang, and laughed so hard that I expected her to wake up and chime in. Because that was my mom. She loved to laugh.
She was on hospice so her passing "isn't a shock". But isn't it always? How do you ever prepare yourself for the loss of your mother?
So many people that have known her have shared messages with me about how she was so loved by this little town (she was in a BYOKA - a women's group about being kind, the Coal Festival Committee, had a restaurant here most of her life, and always was the first to help out in any fundraiser or to step up when someone was sick). My mom was a planner, a doer, a get-this-done kind of woman. The funeral director told me she will always be remember as always having a smile and never too busy at the restaurant to not come out and see and chat with her customers. Everyone was family to her. I've heard that a hundred times this week. Someone told me she helped raise every kid that came through this town for many years and that's true.
I'm way behind on messages and emails and I don't know when I can catch them up. I haven't slept really at all since Sunday of last week, before I left to come here, and I think I'm delirious. Please give me a little grace for the next couple of weeks as I lay my mom to rest and figure out how to be an only child. It's probably not going to be easy ... but I'll be okay. Because my mom was the strongest woman I know and I am her daughter. <3
#adrianalocke

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My first piece of swag! 🙌🏼🤣💙

I found this in one of my childhood jewelry boxes at my mom’s house. I think I got this in a box set of @babysittersclub books in third or fourth grade. It instantly made me smile and remember how I’d beg my moms to go to @samsclub to get the box sets when they came out. 🙏🏼

This is the first series I obsessed over and I totally thought I could be Kristy’s BFF. I secretly wanted to be Claudia though.

What was the first book or series that you remember falling in love with with?

#adrianalocke #adrianalockebooks #annmmartin #babysittersclub #button #throwbacktuesday #nostalgia #90s

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Someone told me early on in my career to write what I know. I know small towns.
I was raised on this corner, locally known as “Park Road” because it’s the road the park was on. On the opposite corner was my grandma’s house and down the street from us (also on the same block) was my uncle’s house. My aunt lived across the street from my uncle.
My town had 900 people, give or take, and I graduated with 24 kids. Most of us went to preschool together.
My mom owned the only restaurant in town and there is still a football award given out every year at the high school that’s named after my great-grandfather.
I write a lot of small-town romance because of these streets. I pen stories of close-knit families, Sunday dinners at grandma’s house, pot lucks, and cozy restaurants where you’re more family than customer because that’s what I know. It’s what made me ... me.
#smalltownlife #adrianalocke #adrianalockebooks #romancebooks #bookstagram

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Sometimes life gets noisy.
No, I don’t mean just the kids or husband or televisions or deadlines. I mean LIFE. All the things. The sum of all the parts.
My life is noisy right now. I try to remember that the noise is a blessing. It means there are people to love, dishes to wash, and a home to tidy. But how do you find the quiet to even think that?
This is my escape, my happy place. A real-life painting by the hand of God that I can walk around in and breathe in the clean, just-rained scent.
My word this year was balance. I’m still working on it. Sometimes I get it right and sometimes I don’t. The key is I’m learning and I’m aware of the necessity of it.
What do you do when your life gets noisy?
#adrianalocke #adrianalockebooks #nature #creativelifehappylife #noisylife

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My very first book went live six years ago today.
I wrote The Exception because my husband dared me to. I published it to learn something new. I kept writing because I found a part of me that I'd lost somewhere between third grade (when I wanted to be an author) and being a mom of four little boys.
I've learned so much on this journey but the most important thing I've realized is this: you have to do something for yourself in life. You have to remember who you are when you take off all the hats you wear every day to survive.
Who are you besides a mom, aunt, wife, employee, daughter, friend, advocate, neighbor? Who are YOU when things get quiet at night and you're sitting in bed, in the dark, and you have that five-second space of time where you aren't worried about that thing you said sixteen years ago? (*winks*)
For me, it's that I am a storyteller that wants to bring sunshine into the world. I want to make people smile, give them hope, and deliver a little respite from the stresses of the day. Escaping into a world I create, and can control, gives me the most pleasure ... and feels like I'm the most "me".
What is that for you? Is it writing? Is it drawing? Is it making clothes? Maybe it's baking elaborate cakes or pole dancing or meditating. Maybe you don't even know anymore. Because I didn't.
I want you to help me celebrate my sixth year in publishing by trying to remember who you used to be (or who you wanted to be). Remember—I always knew I wanted to be a writer. I just forgot. It was hard to remember that little girl inside ma and her big dreams because the hats I wore and the weight of the world hid it a little bit.
Today, I challenge you to think about when you feel the most "you". Think back on your life and what you used to love, what gives you joy, what made/makes you want to get out of bed in the morning or what you race/raced to do when your daily tasks were/are complete. See how that makes you feel.
I can't imagine my life now without writing and it makes me sad to think about all the years I went without it. Don't go without things that give you life. Don't wear so many hats that you forget what your hair looks like. 😉
#adrianalocke

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