As everyone must know by now thanks to the multitude of posters across the school, Emmy Laybourne visited Lenape last week. I had the great fortune of eating pizza and chatting with her.

  At first, the atmosphere hung damp with awkwardness. Especially as the LTV students filmed the experience. (Though I’m glad they did) There were twelve of us sitting in the LGI with Emmy accompanied by Mr. Strittmatter. This was meant to be unconstructed time to pick Mrs. Laybourne’s brain on whatever we wanted. However, many of us were at a loss on just what to say.

   So, the confident person she is, Emmy Laybourne encouraged us to ask her whatever questions crossed our minds. Brave hands shot up. Mrs. Laybourne answered with charisma and quirkiness dripping with each syllable. Questions mostly revolved around how she came to her success and what advice she’d give to young aspiring writers. Something that stuck was when Emmy told us a contradictory statement to everything young writers are told.