Recently a friend of mine completed his undergraduate degree – Cum Laude.

Like a great book or piece of art, how it came to pass goes well beyond it simply being an outstanding achievement worthy of praise and honour. There’s the behind the scenes, the unseen, the consistent, ardent daily grind over long periods of time that underpins such a notable grade. What makes Dave’s Cum Laude truly amazing, is that he’s done it as a single dad in his forties raising his son on his own with a full-time job that demands travel…

It’s a superhuman feat.

It’s a shining example of ferocious tenacity.

Dave’s wonderful news reminds me to look up, again, afresh at the framed cheque written out by Charles Dickens to someone named Cox for 3 pounds, 18 shillings (I think) back in 1865. It hangs on my wall watching over my writing desk.

It’s a reminder that Dickens had a really rough start to life. While his father languished in debtor’s prison, young Charles’s had to get work labelling pots and blackening boots at 15 years of age. He never finished school. In those days, many in his position would have continued to live a hard, cruel existence towards an early grave.

But not Charles Dickens.

From this bleak and utterly disadvantaged starting block Dickens rose to write 15 novels, countless articles and letters, got involved in the theatre, travelled widely, became a philanthropic defender of downtrodden women while fighting for children’s rights. And he had ten children of his own. Yes – 10!

He was prolific, producing a monumental amount of work without all the technology and conveniences we take for granted today. Without word processing, spell check or AI. No internet much less electricity. Sans antibiotics. All he had was uncountable fountain pens and inkwells, paper and candles to do his work. A Christmas Carol, Great Expectations and Oliver Twist have become household names to so many across the world – even to those that have never read a novel.

My Aunt gave me this old, framed cheque years ago. At the time I didn’t understand its significance even though I knew enough about the man who wrote it out over 150 years ago. The appreciation has deepened the more I’ve written, the harder I’ve doggedly pursued my dream of writing full time.

But it’s also become a symbol that that tells me to quit my complaining before it can be listened to, to know my procrastination is only fear, and to look upon it as often as required when I’ve almost convinced myself that it’s all just too hard.

It is hard. That’s how we can tell something is worth doing.

Ferocious tenacity. It’s the only way.