Turning Light into Food

[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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We still might feed the dark thing in us that grows away from the light until against all sense we mysteriously flower in the other direction.
Mark Nepo

I know how I turn light into food in my life. I don’t always choose that path, much to my dismay, but I know how to do it. I go through periods when the light shines, and I grow. I bloom like perpetual spring. There are also periods where darkness and hunger settle in, and I wither on the vine grasping for the last taste of green. The trick becomes finding my light: knowing what my light looks like and finding wisdom in failure, daily joy, and peace during the chaos.

Thoughts on turning light into food

Turner syndrome

For many years, I did not consider my Turner syndrome diagnosis light in my life. It was shrouded in silence and shame. For the first 15 years of my life, I did not know about Turner syndrome, and I wanted to forget it for the next twenty. During those years, the darkness of the diagnosis fed a hunger. I felt fear and isolation. I wanted to be normal.

Creativity

I am never hungry when I create. My cells sing when I create. The flowers of my thoughts bloom with words that come from a place I can not name. (Maybe my heart. Maybe a soul I am just becoming brave enough to explore. Maybe the sum of my experiences.) Creativity and imagination feed me. Finding confidence. Shedding shame. Belting songs. Becoming characters. Telling stories. That is the cellular reaction that sustains me and allows me to grow.

Connection

Connecting with others feeds my soul, too. I flow between reaching out and looking in. That balance happens naturally — like the amount of sunlight in the day. I grow as I nurture relationships and make connections. I am hungry when I choose barriers, isolation, and fear.