Rocking the Pink (32 page)

It was a magical year. It was the year I found, and revealed, my true voice.

Not surprisingly, then, it was also the year I wrote this book.

Whenever Matt went off on another leg of his tour, temporarily halting progress on the album and leaving me pent up with unfulfilled artistic energy, I quenched my creative thirst by arranging words on my computer screen for hours at a time. Every night after I put the girls to sleep, and after Brad's rhythmic breathing next to me confirmed he'd drifted off into dreamland, I crept to my computer and wrote, and wrote, and wrote, usually until the wee hours of the morning.

And whenever Matt came home, I swapped my nighttime writing sessions for recording sessions with him.

Thus, throughout that year, the two projects—the book and the album—became indistinguishable to me, two means of telling the same story simultaneously.

When I released my second album in early 2011, which I christened
I'm Still Here
(complete with a back-cover photograph of my badass tattoo), I held my breath, eager to find out if the world would hear the new clarity in my voice. And if people did hear it, would they like it?

I got my answer soon enough: A respected music blog called my album “a brilliant and emotionally naked artistic turn” and applauded its “startling emotional honesty.”

And then
Billboard
magazine, a truly iconic music publication, ranked me number three on its list of the top fifty emerging artists in the world. Not too shabby for a forty-year-old (former) lawyer, wife, and mother of two! And it got even better: For twenty weeks following my initial entry onto the Billboard chart, I remained there, bouncing around, week after glorious week.

“I feel like a proud father,” Mark Hudson said when he called to congratulate me on my album, which I'd sent to him with an effusive thank-you note. “You did it, Laura!
You did it.
It's a masterpiece.”

But before I could get too full of myself, he added, “Now, Laura, it's time to go even further. I know you've got even more inside you!”

And, of course, he was right.

This book's existence has depended on the support and generosity of some very special people. At the top of the list is Brad, my woobie and my rock. Let's face it: Your memorable zingers throughout the years have supplied half the content of this book. And my lovely little girls deserve so much credit, too. Sophie, in particular: You peeked over my shoulder the entire time I wrote this book (except when I told you to go away because I was writing something intended for “mature audiences”), and your exclamations of “Mommy, you are such a good writer!” and “Mommy, you are so funny!” kept me going and believing in myself. Even when you were ten years old, I trusted your judgment that much, honey. Chloe, my little stick of dynamite: Keep dreaming, keep singing, keep writing, keep strutting your stuff, little mama. Thank you so much for your great idea that led me directly to the title of this book!

Jane Barker, My Dearest Jane, my chemo buddy and soul sister, thank you for holding my hand from across the pond. Allyson
Aabram, you read and reread every draft of this book and pushed me to reveal more and more. Thank you. Dad, you can see what I see, even when it's crazy! I love you, Pops. Jill Marr, thank you for believing in me and changing my life. Sharon, words on a page aren't enough. You know what you mean to me. Mom, thank you for calling me Lamby when I was little. Matthew, you showed me who I could be. Lorlou, you inspired me to be a writer. Thanks and acknowledgment to my entire family for their boundless love and support.

Thank you to the wonderful folks at Seal Press, especially my editor, the generous and spirited Brooke Warner. Special acknowledgment and heartfelt thanks to Andrew Hampshire, Paula Dozzi, Lesley Ballard, Cristina Almeida, my CBL brothers, JR Reed, Jack Black, Mark Hudson, Triple Negative Breast Cancer Foundation, Jennifer Griffin, Amanda Nixon, Kimmy McAtee, Keep A Breast, David Fishof, Beverly Trainer, Caroline and Emil Wohl, Tommy Sablan and the Jeff & Jer team, Wildy Haskell, the folks at Right Recordings, Jennifer Argenti, Leslie Tall Manning, Martha Lawrence, Lisa Pulitzer, Joni Rodgers, the Bogans, the Zamoyskis, Tiffanie Kasner, Heather Dugdale, and, of course, The Bunco Girls. And to those of you mentioned throughout this book: I'm a better person for having known you (or, in some instances, having dreamed of knowing you).

Laura Roppé is an award-winning singer-songwriter, cancer survivor, speaker, and former attorney from San Diego, California. She obtained a BA in theater arts from UCLA (summa cum laude) but then pursued the “family business” by attending law school at the University of San Diego, where she graduated number two in her class, and went on to practice employment/business litigation for over a decade.

In 2008, the year of her diagnosis with triple negative breast cancer at age thirty-seven, Laura ditched her legal career to follow her musical dreams in earnest, winning Americana Single of the Year at the 2009 Los Angeles Music Awards. Upon the release of Laura's second album,
I'm Still Here,
which she wrote during chemo treatments,
Billboard
magazine ranked her number three on its chart of the top fifty emerging artists in the world. Laura spends her time with her husband, two daughters, and dog, Buster; writes and sings; plays bunco on the second Tuesday of every month with her girlfriends; and, last but not least, devises various schemes to get herself into the Copacabana. For more information, go to
www.lauraroppe.com
.

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Rocking the Pink
Finding Myself on the Other Side of Cancer

Copyright © 2012 by Laura Roppé

 

Published by
Seal Press
A Member of the Perseus Books Group
1700 Fourth Street
Berkeley, California

 

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission from the publisher, except by reviewers who may quote brief excerpts in connection with a review.

 

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

 

Roppé, Laura, 1970-

Rocking the pink : finding my rock star self on the other side of cancer / Laura Roppé.

p. cm.

eISBN : 978-1-580-05454-6

1. Roppé, Laura, 1970—Health. 2. Breast—Cancer—Patients—Biography. I. Title.

RC280.B8R66 2012

362.196'994490092—dc23

[B]

2011027014