[The Stage is on Fire] is a page-turner in which, much like life, there are no easy answers and yet each step of the journey yields insight and hope. This work of heart must not be missed!
Melanie Faith
Creative Writing Teacher, Essayist & Poet.
Katie Steedly’s first-person piece [The Unspeakable Gift] is a riveting retelling of her participation in a National Institutes of Health study that aided her quest to come to grips with her life of living with a rare genetic disorder. Her writing is superb.
The Society of Professional Journalists
In recognition of receiving the Dateline Award for the Washingtonian Magazine essay, The Unspeakable Gift.
I thank you … It is the authenticity of your “class notes”; and it is the delicacy and skill with which you present the nuances of classroom life and the actuality of your students’ and fellow teachers’ lives.
Maxine Greene
Philosopher and Education Scholar
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The Woman the Boy Became
Growing is what anyone would do.
From Kat Tempest’s “The Woman the Boy Became“
Given the particulars
She knew what she knew
She was ridiculous.
Born too smart and too dumb.
“We are all born too smart and too dumb.” That thought really resonates with me, for a lot of reasons. I think back to never being smarter than when I was 12, or 18, or 25. Growing and “wisdom” coincided with learning what I did not know, and believing in my bones that curiosity is the antidote for so much — cynicism, hopelessness, rigidity, wrongness, and even anger. Wisdom has gradually, and continues to, become something that emerges as I grow relearning (the things I knew as a child but forgot) and learning (the new things I grow to understand) happens. Listening to my still small voice. Choosing courage and love over shame and fear. Believing that I can be me and still be loved.
I am reminded that as we grow we are guided by truths that are unique and precious and meant to be cherished. Love enters in and shakes it all up. Love shakes up our relationship with ourselves and others. Love shakes up the how we live in this world. Love even shakes up its own meaning as hearts break, minds expand, and hands hold. Love is powerful like that. Perhaps growing is all we are truly asked to do. Perhaps wisdom, in all of this, is just remembering and/or returning to love.
About Katie
Born in Louisville. Live in Atlanta. Curious by nature. Researcher by education. Writer by practice. Grateful heart by desire.
Buy the Book!
The Stage Is On Fire, a memoir about hope and change, reasons for voyaging, and dreams burning down can be purchased on Amazon.
