Author Archive: sharpejody76@gmail.com

Tuesdays With The Angels-Messages From Heaven

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My latest novella, New Angel In Town, as in all my ten books, is  filled with messages from heaven. These messages of my own or told to me from family, friends and people I meet at book fairs, keeps me resilient and writing onward. The following recent story is one of my own.

On my late daughter, Kate’s birthday, a while ago heaven sent me a  message. Was it from Kate or the angels who I trust are near me each day? In the house I lived in for twenty one years after she passed away, geese would fly over head each day. I would go outside loving the sound of their calling  to each other. I loved their joy in the way they formed a perfect v. There  was always a straggler, a goose that had to catch up as if  he or she was a child on a schoolyard  catching up to his friends. I would always count the number flying over head. Why? I  wanted them to reach the number seventeen for that was Kate’s birthday date. Once in a while there would be seventeen geese and I would feel they had been sent to me to remember my joy at being her mother.

Recently, on the week of Kate’s birthday,  while looking at the sky in my new backyard, there they were again  very high in the sky. Amazingly, I’ve never seen them above this house I’ve lived in for a few years because there are no lakes near our home. But there they were greeting me high, closer to heaven as they moved towards a lake somewhere. Seventeen of them graced the air in perfect formation. As always there the straggler was catching up to the others.

I receive  so many messages from heaven and the angels.  Nature’s beauty surrounds us. I write about kindness and love, about thwarting bullies and helping others. I know I write with help from above. Maybe my writing can help others see the world as I do. There is profound heavenly strength in love and kindness. These are the foundations to awaken the spirit. Loving and helping others keeps my own humble life moving forward toward joy.  Everyday I  find signs filled with love like me running out of my back door again in total surprise to watch the majesty of geese flying overhead. In my latest novel the eight angels of Mystic Bay fly forming a perfect v as they fly to help a family somewhere in need. 

 

 

Tuesdays With The Angels- New Mystic Bay Series New Angel In Town

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My latest novella, New Angel In Town, is a labor of love as all my books are. However, this one is different from the others in the Mystic Bay Series. This book has a compilation of all the angel stories ever told to me from family members, friends, and people at book fairs. These are true accounts of  real encounters people have experienced in their lifetimes.  I decided to write a  book in the series  bringing all the characters,  townsfolk and the angels living as humans together telling their angel stories. The secret is known to a few but the angels have their own favorite stories of helping those in need in Mystic Bay. These stories told to a filmmaker will  become a film to inspire humanity.

How did writing the Mystic Series start? Thirty years ago, my  treasured first child, Kate tragically passed away.  I was beyond hope yet found heaven had a plan for me. An angel was sent to me  to comfort me. He appeared as a human undexpectedly as a friend took me on a girl’s trip to help my grief. He was at a department store and spoke to us then appeared again the next day walking up to Nancy and me again in a tiny store forty miles away. I can see his face in my mind. It seemed an unlikely and miraculous encounter. He told us he’d see us at the airport. Then Nancy and I turned away for a moment and turned back and he was gone. We looked for him up and down the street but he was nowhere. Believing he is my guardian angel, I started writing stories about angels living as humans in a town where the secret is kept that angels are all around us guiding us, sometimes appearing as humans. 

And so it is an honor to write the stories I’ve been told by friends, family and people I met at book fairs. These are true stories from their hearts, their encounters that changed their own lives. I ask them, ‘Tell me your angel stories’ and people do.

Writing this book was a labor of love and hopefully readers will see the humanity, the soul searching, the honesty and vulnerability many have shared with me. The themes involve child advocacy, friendship, bullying, romance with magical scenes of flying angels and visions of their missions. The storyline weaves it all together in a tapestry of hope. I’m sure that meeting my angel long ago gave me  hope to keep going and to ultimately write angel stories to inspire hearts. Tell me your angel story if you can. This novella is filled with encounters from the hearts of many who confidied in me their precious miraculous stories. I’ve put them into a fictional novella to radiate kindness and love. Angels are everywhere.

Tuesdays With The Angels-Hopes and Dreams

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As a child I never dreamed I could become a writer. I was a shy girl who loved to write little stories and poems and yet this evolved  years later through moments of hope through dreams of a better future.

When my daughter, Kate, passed away years ago I thought I couldn’t go on. But hope sometimes comes in dreams and one dream weeks after Kate’s death changed the course of my life.

A dream,came unexpectedly to read the book, Charlotte’s Web, a children’s book. There would be a message in it. Never having a message like this before during sleep and with hope in my heart, I bought the book. The message at the end of the book was clear. Just as Wilbur the pig would go on without his friend, Charlotte, the spider, I would go on with my life, loving those left for me to care for, my surviving childen, my husband, my friends and students.

When I met a  man I know was an angel months later, I felt compelled to write about angels, grief, loss, forgiveness, over coming bullying and moving forward with kindness in my heart and hope for the future. This culminated in years now of writing stories from the heart. 

Over the years, my writing has evolved with a memoir, Special Needs Children The Angels On My Shoulder,  my children’s book, When The Angel Sent Butterflies, and many heartfelt stories in my Mystic Bay Series.  My tenth book coming this new year, will surround the same themes and angel stories with a new character, an angel in town.

So many hopes and dreams have come true for me. Grief and loss happened but how I’ve handled it is thanks to my belief in angels and God. I believe the ability to write came from above. Some readers feel my books bring hope for a more kind tomorrow. It’s happening all around us now, a change, a love for our fellow man, an awareness, a spiritual awakening of the gratitude for our earth, our lives, and each other. I had my spiritual awakening years ago once upon a dream, a dream which came true. 

Tuesdays With The Angels-If I Were An Angel I’d Whisper, “Kindness Stays”

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Why do I write books about angels? Is it because I think I met an angel once or is it because kindness has stayed with me  even through the darkest times?  I remember all the kindnesses others have bestowed on me, those I know and strangers passing through the moments of my life. Being kind helps my life with an indescribable feeling of love.

When I see the daily hurt others in our world inflict on those less fortunate or troubled, I realize the energy of  hate and bullying never can match the gift of life and ability to love we’ve been given. Why doesn’t everyone see this? When I write myMystic Bay novels  kindness is always a main theme in the fictional town of Mystic Bay.

If  I were an angel, I would whisper all  to remember kindness is a gift that can be shared. It is a holy thing sent to us from above. Having a heart full of kindness for others with an avenue to forgive has seen me through the losses in my life, the hard times, the restless nights of solving problems. To be kind brings joy to my life. Kindness stays.

 Madam Norma, the wonderful character in all my books, is based on my dear friend of forty years who passed away at ninety-four. She was always the dearest friend, a surrogate mother to me. She lost both her children and her husband yet she continued to be kind to others, loving her life while creating joy for others. So in my books, I impart a phrase of wisdom that must have come from an angel’s whisper. My character Madam Norma always says, “Kindness is the first ingredient of love.” 

Tuesdays With The Angels-It’s A Wonderful Life & My Very Own Angel

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It was Christmas time a few years ago. I  met a man outside a grocery store. We were putting our carts back in the proper place assigned for them but others had put their carts on the sidewalk or in front of other cars or in handicapped spaces. I remember this man said, “Everybody is acting like a Mr. Potter,” He was referring the film,  It’s A Wonderful Life. I was surprised he mentioned the old film but he and I briefly exchanged our disappointment in others. As we left, I wondered how he knew I had watched the 1946 classic film. Was it a coincidence? Or was he a messenger from above?

The themes in my Mystic Bay Series have  always been inspired by the iconic  Christmas film, It’s A Wonderful Life.  Set during World War II, the theme resonates today as bullies around the globe try to bring us down to our knees. In the film, George Bailey, a kind son, has to take over the family business when his father dies. Now he can’t follow his dreams of seeing the world.  The bully in town, Mr. Potter,   tries to destroy George’s family business and takeover the town. George  becomes despondent and decides the world would be better off without him. Yet, heaven and Clarence, his guardian angel, have a lesson for him. His angel, appearing as an older gentleman, comes from heaven and  shows George what life would be like in the town if he’d never been born. George saved his brother’s life as a child by pulling him from an icy pond. That would have never happened if George had never been born.  At the hands of  Mr. Potter, George’s wife would have never married and    the town would be ruined by Mr. Potter’s cruelty and greed.

The theme resonates with me as I write my soon to be eighth book in the Mystic Bay Series where angels live as humans guiding the townsfolk with love. In the film, George changes his attitude and handles the bully as he realizes his wonderful life. The town comes together to help him thwart the bully with their friendship. 

Long ago, after my daughter died, I met an angel of my own.  My friend, Nancy, took me on a girl’s trip. The distinguished man was standing by the cash register in a department store.  We exhanged pleasantries as  he said he was on business and we explained we were on a girl’s trip. I think now his business  really was showing me that he was my guardian angel.

Surprising us, we encountered him the very next day as he walked up and greeted us in a small gift store miles away. He smiled at the coincidence of us meeting again. He told us we would see him at the airport. We turned away to look at some items a little taken aback at the coincidence that he was there. Then we  looked back to find he had disappeared. His   presence had been surreal and it  comforted me. My fear of flying had escalated since my daughter’s passing. We had met him twice in a twenty-four hour time period. I suddenly wasn’t afraid to fly anymore. Nancy and I decided right then that he must have been an angel sent to comfort me.

This theme is in all my books. My Christmas novel is typical of the love I try to create in my themes. Finding joy with the help of friends and family and helping others is key to having our own wonderful life.  Counting on the fact that our angels are all around guiding us helps me daily. I believe the bully never wins and love is always triumphant. Angels are with us. Was that man at the grocery store parking lot sent from above to remind me of the thought  that we have a wonderful life? Nancy and I still speak of the man angel we met years ago.  That day, he changed my life. I met my very own Clarence. I thank him everyday.

Tuesdays With The Angels- Hope Grow Love

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I had lunch with old friends and one asked us what advice we’d give our grown children if there was one important message. My answer was a simple one. Stay close and love each other. Be together.

It’s part of my daily attitude of how precious life is and how fast it goes. One friend spoke of a bully in our high school. I always think of bullies as troubled souls and write them as characters in my Mystic Bay Series. In the novels, the bullies always learn lessons and some of them change for the better. Hope is always present in my thinking. To me, hope is a prayer for things to change for the good.

It seems like yesterday my kids were babies and now I have grandchildren. The years have  gone by so quickly. Wisdom does come with the years and I put what ideas I feel the angels send me into all my books.

Hope Grow Love is a message to ponder, isn’t it? I’ve just finished my latest Mystic Bay novel. It’s at the editors for her final and brilliant editing. I put my heart and soul in these books. Long ago, when the high school bully tried to hurt me, somehow I had the strength within through the years to move forward.

As a teacher, I knew and could intrinsically feel, the heart and needs of my students with special needs. I knew how to be a team with my late husband and my present husband. I knew how to be a supportive mother to my living children and that I had done the best I could at the time mothering my late daughter.

We can find joy if we traverse through all the troubles of life, living the best we can, growing  without even knowing it, and loving as hard as we can. The bully never wins and love is always triumpant.

 

With the new day comes new strength and new thoughts.

Eleanor Roosevelt

Tuesdays With The Angels-Angels & Sunflowers

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In the summer my husband and I happily live in a mountain town. There, I marvel as August comes and the wild sunflowers emerge from the ground with spectacular precision as they sway with the wind. This year two grew in the yard and I knew when I saw the little bit of green they would be wild sunflowers blown in from the fields and forests nearby. The wild ones grew tall in September and as late in the summer came they still hadn’t bloomed. One is just opening up and the first one bloomed  two days ago. October has arrived with fall chilly morning air, so I wait for the second one with hope to fully bloom before the frost comes.

The little miracles happened  as they grew when both their closed faces seemingly overnight  turned toward the east and the morning sunlight.  It made me think of the problems of our world. I’d asked the angels to help sunflowers, and the pumpkins in my garden. I asked for the flock of  black birds to return in August for their brief time at the feeder and they did. I ask everyday for  humanity to help each other around the world..

Since I’m a writer of angel stories, I ask the angels to help people see the need to help each other  the way nature cares for all the trees,  flowers and plants. In these times when hope seems to fade toward peace, we have everything we need to help ourselves and our world. Turing our  faces to  heaven, we can feel the gift of life just as the late blooming wild sunflowers in my yard instinctively did.

Tuesdays With The Angels-Resilience & Joy vs Bullying

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Resilience means  The capacity or withstand or recover quickly from difficulties ;toughness .

Today in our world and our country when bullying has meant most of the US citizens are scared, many to speak out I, as an author, am not afraid. The first amendment clearly stated  Freedom of Speech to be the primary important part of living in our democracy.

I am not afraid of anything. I’ve lived a full life with many sorrows but mostly with many joys. Resilience is my strength. Finding joy by helping our own families but by helping those in need in our country and around the world, will help thwart the bullying that has erupted.

Finding calm in a storm by prayer, positive healing thoughts, speaking out against cruelty and loving each other will help us all. I don’t know the anwers to everything but I do know this. When my daughter Kate, passed away, and I felt guilt that I could not save her, I somehow with help from above found the resilience to keep going for my teenage children, my family and students. I had to grow as a human being with God’s gift of kindness and love to show those around me and those I will never meet my kindness. As a saying goes ‘Fear is at the door but faith answers it’.

My father and my father-in-law fought in the second world war to defend democracy and the spread of evil. The bully of today will never find peace or joy by hurting others with racism and bigotry.

 Hurting others can never bring joy. It will only hurt the soul of the bully. I write books about angels with the themes ‘Love always wins’ and ‘The bully never does win in the end’. Sometimes a bully can change. So I ask God and the angels to help the bully see the light of love and joy.  Nurturing your soul towards loving kindness is the way to happiness and to live the gift of our precious life.

Tuesdays With The Angels-Threads of Love vs. Bullying

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Many of us have been bullied as children or adults. We remember it don’t we? What we remember mostly is the love for us that is never ending from family, friends or a just from a moment of kindness from a stranger. Threads of love are here to stay. They can’t ever be destroyed by hate and are stronger than bursts of anger and fear which are the characteristics of bullying.  

  The thread of love is impenetrable.  Love is the winner in most of the films and shows we view like the films of superheroes who not only have  brawn but might,  the strength of love in their souls. There are millions of people who are superheroes to their families, their friends, their jobs, their constituents. Their might is made of love threads. If we only can recognize the superhero in ourselves. Bullies don’t have superhero qualities. They don’t  choose love over revenge, jealousy or hate.

What we, who fight hate in the world, can do is to just keep building upon our love for our fellowman, those less fortunate, those in need wherever in our world. Working together is a love thread for someone or something other than ourselves.

We need to be voting for people in our government positions who care about people and their families, their futures, applauding  goodness like  the superheroes on the screen. Humanity is humans being kind to other humans in spite of our different races, religions and creeds. 

In reality there is no place for the bully in society. For  bullying is synonamous with hate. But bullies can change if they really want to. What will it take? Will they learn from those of us who believe in fairness, love and kindness? Hope is always possible. I obviously believe in angels and write about love and bullying in my books. The bully always changes as I write. So I ask with a heart full of hope that all  bullies change somehow after an incident of kindness someone has done for them.

People who are role models of goodness can spark an idea, do a good deed or do something that might turn the bully’s head around.  The love thread is unbreakable.  I can almost hear the angels whisper to me in my mind, ” Love is forever triumphant. Nothing is impossible with love at the helm.”

Tuesday With The Angels-Goodwill vs Bully

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I always ask the angels to give me  words as I write my novellas and blogs. I knew a healer who said when I asked him what to do about others who are critical or cruel to me or those I love, he said, “Wish them well.”  

How powerful it is to wish well those who are unkind to us. In all the  books I write, goodness always wins and the bully learns. Today with so many bullies plagueing our media my belief now and forever is that hopefully someday they will see the light kindness brings. Wishing them well but also wishing them knowledge are compatible. In my new  book set in Mystic Bay I am writing, the angels who live as humans in Mystic Bay, impact everyday lives with thoughtful gestures and examples of kindness and understanding.

We are fortunate  to be here on earth to help our families, our friends as well as those we might never know. Our impact to help those in need will fly on angels wings little by little spreading love and kindness. Thoughts of love have power and change. Love is always more powerful than hate. Remember, we can be stewards of kindness, light workers, lighting the way to a path of kindness. The bully never wins!

My NFPW  2025 National Award for The Dog Who Came For Christmas!