Birthday Cakes and Crystal Skulls

When I faced the blazing display of my birthday cake this year, I couldn't help but reflect on the mysterious crystal skull used by Lilith in my The Chronicles of Susah trilogy. We're all familiar with the tradition of making a wish and then blowing out the candles. In Lilith's case, she was seeking information from the powerful voice, which spoke only to her. The skull first appears in the second chapter of THE DRAGONEERS and eventually plays an essential role in the series.

Anyone who's read that first adventure of Susah, the daughter of the most noted shipwright in history, will attest to the intensity of the action. After the screaming and terror that filled the back room of Lilith's Lair, the voice gave Lilith some advice she desired to help her obtain her selfish goal of obtaining the secrets of the Garden of Eden. It takes three novels to fully develop that story element, and along the way Susah and her readers experience myriad challenges.

Sometimes we discover the things we were seeking weren't really the things we wanted. A wise woman once told me, "It's better to want something you don't have than to have something you don't want." Have you ever experienced that?

Wouldn't it be great, if when you blew out the candles on your birthday cake, you could send a message back to yourself during your last birthday. Transcending time and space, if that were possible, what advice would you give to the person you were a year ago?

While I managed to extinguish the candles with the obligatory single breath, I wondered what words of wisdom I would have said to my younger self, assuming I could. Unlike the voice that spoke to Lilith, I think some sage advice for me would have been, "Eat a little less, sleep a little more, and let those whom you care the most for hear how important they are to you."

Come to think of it, that would be good advice for this coming year.

Thanks for reading.