Laura Stearns
THE WRITER
My favorite teacher in 5th grade was my English teacher, Mrs. Griffith. She was a beautiful black woman with manicured nails and I loved the way she held our attention in class. As a child, I had no idea why she was such a great teacher, but looking back I would say she owned the room. She respected us and in return we respected her.
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Mrs. Griffith told me I was a good writer. She liked my poetry and was always encouraging no matter what the assignment was. She showed me how to love words, to craft them, not just use them.
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I have done many things in my life: raised children, worked in theater on and off stage, and advocated for things that are important to me—but I have always come back to writing.
I started writing my blog in January of 2020. I was doing some heavy emotional lifting with advocacy work in my community and writing my memoir Shattered. My blog was a place to set down some of my thoughts, or step away and write about something else.
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When the Pandemic hit, blogs became a way for so many of us to remedy our craving for connection. We were trying to express our humanity in a way that would make us feel seen in our isolation, and to make sense of the tumultuous world around us.
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My mother was dying of Alzheimer's in the middle of all that. I needed a way to process some of what I was witnessing in her deterioration, and document some of the absurdities of this disease. Writing was a way to bring some balance to a situation that felt off kilter. And I wanted what I was learning about the disease to be helpful to others, so I wrote. Many of my posts are about my mom.
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I'm so happy to have built a life where I get to integrate my passion for writing. I write for fun, I write to make a point, and I write to help others find the best way to say something. I hope Mrs. Griffith would be happy to know her efforts impacted me so deeply.