It was the first thing I read that day. I had just woken up and looked at my phone. There was a message from some guy asking,

“Hi Kristin, would you like to submit a poem for a CD on World Peace for the United Nations?”

I am cynical when I haven’t had my first cup of coffee yet. Oh hell… that’s not the only time I’m cynical. Before this question showed up in my Facebook Messenger on January 15, 2015, I was skeptical of the intentions any man I didn’t know, much less one asking a question so laced with grandiose possibilities. Armed with a cup of coffee, Google and Facebook, I researched. Who the HECK is Kevin Mackie.

We’ve got friends in common, okay, that’s good. Let’s see who this joker is… In his profile picture, he’s holding a Grammy.

A WHAT?! A GRAMMY??

There’s a guy, holding a Grammy, asking ME if I want to write a poem for the UN…for a CD… brain spinning… More research reveals that Kevin’s Grammy is for a spoken word anti-bullying CD he produced.

I’m listening.

A phone call later, I was tasked with writing a poem about world peace for a CD for the United Nations. Reality set in that it had been roughly 25 years since I had penned a poem. Many a detention was spent in high school, pouring out my teenage angst on notebook paper, but many moons had passed since then. I did not expect for my prose to be worthy of a CD for the UN, but I figured I had nothing to lose for trying. All I had to do was write the poems and submit them, and Kevin and his fellow producers would consider including my work in the CD.

Three poems later, I sweated bullets as I clicked send. And then I waited.

And waited.

Aaaaand…. waited…

Until the email came that said, Kristin, we’ve selected one of your poems for our CD, congratulations!

WOAH!!!

Months later, I was attending a Nelson Mandela festival that was organized by the UNESCO club, the Center for Peace, when I met the man who I