It has taken 19 years for Joyce Galewick to write down all the stories she wants to tell. The stories that she hand wrote; more than 500 pages. So with every "T" crossed and "I" dotted, Joyce was fulfilling a promise to her daughter Debbie.
"She said, 'I want you to write a book because if you write a book everybody will know my story and my life will be worth something,'" said Joyce, remembering the conversation with her daughter. "If you don't write a book, I'll die and nobody will ever know that I lived."
That story started in 1997 when Debbie was diagnosed with lung cancer. Doctors gave her three weeks to live. She fought for 11 months and it was in those fragile moments, Joyce
started to notice glimpses of hope; small miracles in the middle of heartbreak.
"She had a nine-hour surgery," Joyce recalled. "They said she'd never walk. She got up and walked the next morning."
It's those moments of hope, Joyce wanted to pass along.
"Every day you get up and is a beautiful day and if you woke up this morning, you have a day," she said.
Joyce still remembers the day not too long ago that she got the call from the publisher wanting to print her book, "Dance Till the Music Stops." The title is key. It's a life lesson this grandmother hopes everyone will realize.
"If the music in life hasn't stopped, you've still got a day to make it beautiful," she said.
Joyce will be singing her book at the Barnes and Noble Bookstore at Dana Park in Mesa on Nov. 19 from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.
