A Message from the Author

Being diagnosed with cancer and undergoing treatment will challenge the strongest of people, both physically and mentally. Life changes in an instant when you hear the “C” word and your mind closes in around you, creating negative spaces. It is a surreal place to be as life continues around you, but you stand still, frozen in a world of unknowns and fear.

During eight months of treatment, which included chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation, my breast cancer diagnosis became a fight against a known but invisible enemy, its power and strength shifting in a body that was beaten down and vulnerable. During chemotherapy, life becomes a blur of pain and nausea. Each day is a challenge to keep moving forward and trying to keep positive. It takes courage to face each day as you recalibrate your expectations in small segments of time.

As days turn into weeks, and then months, your daily life becomes limited and stagnant. However, there were joyful moments when I learned to meet myself in each phase with grace, not pressure. Observing nature became a practice that helped me quiet my mind and embrace life. Swallows nesting by my bedroom window, the joy of watching fawns with their mothers, observing bees, trees, and flowers. These moments allowed my mind to settle and be calm. They were a gift, a place where the universe allowed me to step away and feel rejuvenated. To feel the barrier between nature and reality narrow gave me courage and clarity to help meet pain head-on and move forward.

These moments became a very important part of my journey and recovery and I promised myself that when treatment finished, and I felt human again, I would spend the next year documenting one item per week that became a ponder spot, a pocket of peace. The project started in the fall of 2024.

52² is a record of those moments. My illustrations, accompanied by short poems, are all in a square format, hence the title, 52². Whatever you are going through . . . grief, fear, loneliness, cancer, anxiety . . . I hope this book will encourage you to walk with the quiet trees, study a flower, take in a view, or just sit in nature. Gratitude for the small things is where the real power lies, and experiencing the dark days makes these moments feel like a precious gift.

Find your pockets of peace.

Jane Brown