We Need Others

[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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Maybe that’s why I want to touch people so often—it’s only another way of talking.
– Georgia O’Keefe

We need others.

We need rocks of safety on which to gather with others. We need rocks of safety on which to stand and rest and breathe when we have climbed and fought and emerged. Rocks of safety can be groups of friends and family, particular places of solitude, gatherings of people with similar wounds and dreams and stories, or rituals that we cherish. Rocks of safety are proof of our interconnectedness. Rocks of safety are comfort in storms. Rocks of safety are there before, during, and after the big deals of our life.

The view from a rock of safety.

We are not alone on rocks of safety. People who love us and who we love are there. We are surrounded in exactly what we need. We see the other side of the pain in which we are living. We celebrate the joy that can be found in even the darkest moments. We feel constancy despite the ebbs and flows. There is peace despite the conflict that might be present. There is home. Our rock can be a place to which we return again and again.

Gratitude for rocks of safety.

Find your rocks of safety. Create as many as your heart can hold. Look in unlikely places. Seek them during times when you want to crawl up in a ball and cry. Seek them when all is well. Reach out and let others in. Be a rock for others. Don’t wait till your well is dry. That is the beauty of rocks of safety. They are natural, unspoken, and generous. Think about the rocks in your life. Make a list of your rocks. Say thank you. Again and again, say thank you.