I remember Peggy on the pier in Howth that day last year when she reminded me that everything we experience is sent to us as a lesson, and that no one or nothing will leave our lives until it has taught us what it was meant to. Matthew’s accident has taught us so much about love, patience and gratitude and it also led me to Jack, the man I love and who I was always meant to be with.

I think of Tom Farley, who never did marry Ana in the end, and who has probably scrawled another few names on his tattooed arms since. I continue to wish him well in my heart, but my thoughts of him are different now and from a distance, just where they belong and where they’ll always be for as long as I live.

I think of the love I have, right here in this room, and I vow that I will never take anything for granted again. I will make mistakes, I know I will, but I also know that I will continue to learn and grow with whatever life throws my way, as we all will.

I’ve learned so much in my thirty-one years so far, but most of all I’ve learned that, although we can try and control our destiny as we take twists and turns in life, turning right, left and even taking the odd wrong turn – no matter how we try and shape it, fate will always make sure we end up exactly where we are meant to be.

I’ve learned that there is no other me out there, and there never really was, of course. I’m exactly where I’m meant to be right now and I want to cherish every single moment.

I want to live in the present. I want to sing again, to teach many more smiling children. I want to love and appreciate my life as I learn and grow.

This is my life. This is where I’m meant to be. This is me.

Acknowledgements

I’ve always had this inkling that in another version of my life I’d have travelled the world and ended up somewhere like Nashville as a songwriter (seriously!). But of course, here I am working in an equally dream career as a novelist with the very best publishers and I have my gorgeous children to enjoy the journey with me, so I wouldn’t change it for the world.

The whole concept of this got me thinking though – how many of us have an alternative path we may have gone down had destiny and fate not led us a certain way? I do believe we meet people and find ourselves in places for a reason, and that’s how the idea of Rewrite the Stars was born.