A couple of days ago, I wrote about how our school is taking on a writing challenge for the third March in a row (read more here). I’m so grateful to have my buddy Dawn to navigate the extra “To-Dos” that add to my daily March list by organizing the school challenge. While we have a hand drawn calendar where staff members signed up for a day to write, like any deadline…sometimes people need reminders. Sometimes, deadlines need extensions…sometimes people plain forget. Because we don’t want to disappoint our daily readers, some who now start their mornings with a little slice reading, Dawn and I sometimes have to pivot. This was the situation we found ourselves in on Saturday night. I had spent the day shuttling my kids from basketball, dance, and soccer. In the middle of the shuttling Dawn and I had contemplated our options via text. If…scheduled writer shares their piece on time, we will post it. If…scheduled writer doesn’t share a piece by 7pm, we will go with Csilla, who sent a rogue piece of writing late Friday afternoon (she wasn’t scheduled to write but was inspired by another colleagues slice).

Despite our “if…then…” plan, Dawn sent me a text after seven that night. “Link?” My job is to post each writer’s piece on our school blog, I then share the link in a shared document that Dawn uses to lift the link, and then writes a daily email to the entire school staff.

I abandoned whatever I had been doing and rushed to my computer. I knew I was holding my partner up…she likes to schedule her daily emails the night before.

As I opened our shared document, I saw that Dawn was right there waiting for me. I linked Csilla’s piece and then saw Dawn typing, “Thanks!!!!” right below. We went back and forth, right there in the document, which I recognized as a slice in the moment. After Dawn left the document, I used my snipping tool to take a literal “slice” out of my life…in this case, the document. You can see the whole wild exchange below:

Life is certainly busy, but I’m a firm believer that we make time for what we value…and I value writing and community. I also value my partner Dawn and all the ways March brings us even closer together!