T.O.P.'s Tuesday ~ Mystery Book Signing Clue #4

Oh my goodness, in exactly one week and a day, the book I vomited onto paper will release for the world to read. At Midnight on April 3, 2013, Where’s Heidi? One Sister’s Journey will be available online. At 6 p.m., The River’s End Bookstore hosts a book signing and release party. And twelve hours after its online release, I will be signing have my first public book signing.

As if this isn’t exciting enough, friends are traveling hours to join us for this day of celebration. Now the decision is to cook or let someone else cook. I want to do some crock pock cooking for the day to feed my friends as they arrive but my husband says I shouldn’t do anything but enjoy the day and to order in. My response, but that cost money and I’ll have nervous energy to burn. But the decision has been made – I’m not cooking. What we will eat is still to be determined but it will either be delivered or picked up my wonderful husband. He is too sweet!!

Do you think it will be nice next week? I wonder if we can sit on the deck and visit and enjoy some sunshine and vitamin D? Time will tell. Time…Heidi disappeared on April 3, 1994. This was also Easter Sunday and Daylight Savings Time. These three triggers remind me of our family and community’s loss. God used the Daylight Savings Time to help witnesses confirm exact times because they had just changed their clocks. The holiday is another aspect of time, holidays tend to stand out in one’s mind. The date, forever the day I last new where my sister was.

Next week, I will visit the places Heidi and I spent so much time together at and ones significant to the case. Of course there is the store, at the intersection of State Route 104 and 104b, the New Haven Volunteer Fire barn, the intersection of County Route 6 and State Route 104 where the Heidi Allen Center moved in May of 94’, and then there is the bridge dedicated to Heidi at the intersection of County Route 6 and County Route 1.

Although I will drive by them all, there is only one where I’ll set up my handmade book signing table (Thank you Dad and Mom – it is beautiful). I will have a tent in case the weather is snowy like it was nineteen years ago. But in the end, I will sign my first public copy of Where’s Heidi? One Sister’s Journey in the same spot I enjoyed time with my sister…it’s up to you to decide which of the above places that might be.

Next Tuesday will be the first T.O.P.’s Tuesday of April. On April 2, 1994 I said good-bye to my sister after much laughter, never knowing it would be our last good-bye. Next Tuesday, we say hello to hope because Where’s Heidi? One Sister’s Journey will release the next day. I will forever miss my sister and I pray this book helps to bring her home.

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After the loss of a loved one, have you noticed how precious your last conversation, adventure, or time spent together becomes? How do you keep that memory alive?