About Alexandra

I was born Alexandra Smith, but I tend to write under the name Tatiana McLaurin.
I was raised in Southern Illinois, and I presently live in Beijing, China.
I, like most people who walk this planet, am complicated.
And it is in honor of that realization, that I describe who I am for you the best way I know how.


Who am I?
Who I was isn’t who I am.
I hope that who I am is only a fraction of who I am destined to become.
Because the world will not be shaped by those who choose to stand still, to remain stagnate,
but by those who see the world as it is- as it moves.
I want to leave my mark on the world; to be in it but not of it.

I can talk to you of who I was,
of my shortcomings and accomplishments,
but they are not me.
I am not: my job, my friends, my family, my fears, my loses, or my loves.
Yet they are all a part of me- Am I my dreams?
Am I the dreams of those who came before me and the memory of those yet to come?

I want to be.
And it is in the honor of those who will only know me as a footnote that I move forward.
That I do not see myself as my wins or losses.
That I do not sit and wait for others to define me.
It is in honor of who I wish to be that I press on through the confusion and the anger towards the future I wish to help build.

I am not yet who I want to be, but I won’t give up till I meet her.