[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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Weekly Wide-Awake: A Portable Paradise
And if I speak of Paradise,
then I’m speaking of my grandmother
who told me to carry it always
on my person, concealed, so
no one else would know but me.
From “A Portable Paradise” by Roger Robinson
A favorite high school religion teacher taught me that heaven is living in the presence of God. He explained we can be in heaven right here on earth, everyday. We can feel God (which I have grown to understand as Love) right now as we serve and create and connect.
I think of paradise the way I think of heaven. Paradise is being surrounded by the presence of love. When I think of traveling to beautiful places, walking in the park near my home, eating meals with dear friends and family, reading poetry that speaks to my heart, hearing stories that inspire humanity and compassion, singing songs that deliver me to particular times and places, making my home a home that is paradise. Close. Wonderful. Abiding.
About Katie
From 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.
