July 15, 2020 – Laura Mae Murphy’s lifelong dream recently turned into reality with her book release, I Can Do This, sharing words with important messages of encouragement and lessons creating empathy through literature for elementary age children from Kindergarten through the sixth grade.
Local writer Laura Mae Murphy's book 'I Can Do This'
is now available at Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
Photo backdrop Southern Lemonade Boutique.
“It’s a small world, but I find that’s not the case when you are trying to reach caring educators, caregivers, religious leaders; anyone with the ability to make change,” stated Murphy. “I can’t stand on a street corner with a sign or shout from a mountain top or any number of things, but I can reach out to you starting today.”
Murphy’s goal is to sell enough hardback copies of I Can Do This to absorb the cost of sending paperback copies to local school libraries and curriculum coordinators as well as college and special education administrators.
About the Author
Laura Mae (Lewis, Murphy) was born in Philadelphia as number two of nine children. She and her family moved twenty-three times in seventeen years, and she often went to three schools a year. Each move brought challenges, trying to catch up academically while trying to fit in socially.
Upon graduating high school, she enlisted in the Army during the Vietnam era hoping to learn, grow and maybe go to college on the GI Bill when she got out. After Basic Training and Advanced Individualized Training, she was sent to Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, where she was the mistress of ceremonies for the Department of Specialized Training. Every week she handed out diplomas and promotions to students from all over the world. Her biggest challenge was pronouncing their name correctly, and she took pride in doing so. She was also asked to represent and make commercials for the Mars Gram, wherein family members could call overseas and talk to their loved ones. Upon being honorably discharged, she made law enforcement her career. And she did go to college on the Gi Bill for criminal justice.
Deafness runs in her family, and she is raising a mentally challenged daughter, Dawn René, who has right temporal lobe epilepsy and is bipolar. At forty-five, she functions at 4.6 level, but her biggest handicap is that she looks normal and everyone expects her to be normal. She becomes flustered and sometimes doesn’t understand why they don’t understand.
Laura is married, thirty-three years to John Murphy and now resides in Texas. She has a total of six children, having lost one. They are yours, mine, ours, and somebody else’s. But they are all hers. The youngest child being Jennifer Denise, who lives next door with her husband, Stephen and their three children, Cameron, Payton, and Marshall Dillon. She loves them all.
In Her Own Words: Laura Murphy’s Book Overview
This book, These Stories, were intended to be used by anyone who has the ability to help these individuals fit in wherever they go. If teachers could use these stories to introduce the problem and possibly the solution to the students prior to the introduction of the student with special needs or problems, there wouldn't be so much apathy in the world.
In using animals instead of names there is no chance of anyone misunderstanding and transferring any of these topics onto anyone specific.
I've tried to cover as many issues as I could: communication, deafness, blindness, birth defects, epilepsy, amputees, etc. But the most important goal is acceptance. There could be role playing (i.e., someone could be the cow or the beaver or the iguana). Interaction could play an important role in getting the message across.
For more information on how to purchase Murphy’s book, I Can Do This, please visit Amazon or Barnes & Noble. Plans are underway for a future book signing with Murphy.
