About Heidi Smith

Author of PLAY ON

My Story

At 15, my plan was to win a Pulitzer Prize for journalism, preferably for heroically dodging bullets in a conflict zone while nailing the story no one else was telling. Three years later, I learned that they also award Pulitzers for humor  (congratulations, Dave Barry!). You can see where this is going. 

Fifteen was a long time ago, and in the intervening years I’ve led backcountry trail crews of rambunctious teenagers, collaborated on cultural exchange programs in the former Soviet Union, counseled underserved teens on a three-masted schooner in the Marshall Islands, taught English as a Foreign Language to international students and immigrants, earned a Masters in Teaching and spent 13 years teaching middle school through college, often within the same day (ask me about the I-5 corridor).

But writing was always there, eventually overcoming Herculean levels of resistance that typically involve cleaning every suface in the house rather than putting butt in seat. I’ve been a humor columnist, editor-in-chief of an international magazine focused on human potential, contributing writer to publications such as South Sound Business, Tacoma Weekly, Educational Leadership and Connected Science Learning. 

Play On is a culumination of my 27 years as a soccer player and coach, 30+ years of intermittent writing, and 59 years of life as a female with all that entails. I’m no longer aiming to dodge bullets, but if the Pulitzer committee is listening, my 15-year-old self is still waiting.