Meet Dwayne Lawson-Brown

Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Dwayne Lawson-Brown. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Hi Dwayne , thanks for sharing your insights with our community today. Part of your success, no doubt, is due to your work ethic and so we’d love if you could open up about where you got your work ethic from?
My work ethic can largely be attributed to watching my great-grandmother and mother create a path for me.

My great-grandmother moved to DC from the Shenandoah Valley with her daughter and two grandchildren. She would work for the US government and provide for our family until her passing in the early 90’s. My mother then took over as breadwinner for our household working multiple small jobs – the most memorable being a stint at the Popeye’s Chicken and Biscuits on the corner of MLK Ave and Portland Street (now known as Malcolm X Ave) Watching her work in that heat, surrounded by food that she couldn’t eat, all for the sake of me and the rest of the family having meals — that lit a fire. I needed to be able to provide for myself to be able to alleviate some of that stress.

I started working at 14 through the DC Summer Youth Employment Program, then started my career in public health at 15 years old. I worked as a peer educator for an organization called Metro TeenAIDS – providing messages about maintaining a positive attitude through poetry, raps, and theater. As my public health career grew, so did my artistic talents and passions. The rest of the story is still being written in breath and blood.

My mother is still one of my biggest inspirations, followed by my child.

Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?
I’m involved in a lot of things.

I’m the Community Engagement Specialist with the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities – helping DC residents and organizations know about the funds available to them to support their ongoing artistic endeavors. I also led a team called the Grant Application Assistance Program that supports people as they apply for commission grants.

I’m the author of 3 books – One Color Kaleidoscope (2019), twenty:21 (2021) and Breaking the Blank, co-authored with Rebecca Bishophall (Day Eight Books; 2022). Each of these books are available via my website

I’m also an open mic host. I’m the former co-host of DC’s longest running open mic – Spit Dat DC. The founder and my good friend Drew Anderson continues to host. I host a monthly open mic at Busboys and Poets 450 k St. NW (4th Wednesday) and a poetry podcast titled “Poets Reading Poetry” – available on all streaming platforms.

I’m also CEO and lead designer for Crochet Kingpin Designs. I create crochet pieces that are released in a monthly drop on my website crochetkingpin.com

I am a karaoke host for District Karaoke – DC’s competitive karaoke league. It’s an exciting and thrilling league that combines the social nature of co-ed sports, with the team based passion of… co-ed sports. I also host karaoke at Busboys and Poets Brookland every first Friday.

I’ve also co-written 2 plays with Drew Anderson – From Gumbo to Mumbo and Push the Button. Both have been produced at Keegan Theater. We are currently working on 2 forthcoming shows and a script book for From Gumbo to Mumbo.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?
Awareness – You have to know where you are. Feel where you are. Recognize what is going on in your life and the lives around you. You are never “lost” if you are present.

Empathy – Take time to be outside of yourself and consider your impact on others. This shapes many of my moves. What you do with your empathy is also important. You are collecting emotional data – are you using that for the greater good or to personally benefit? how are others using your emotions. Once you are in tune with your empathy – you get to make more informed decisions.

Pay Yourself – you can’t save the world if you are starving. No individual can save “the” world. But we can save “our world and the people in it. With empathy and awareness… we can support each other in saving our collective worlds… and “the” world would be covered. But you can’t do that if you aren’t taking care of yourself.

If you knew you only had a decade of life left, how would you spend that decade?
There is a perception that because I’m “booked and busy” that things are all going well. I struggle, daily. Depression and anxiety are a regular in my life. They show up often in my work. Though I have learned to navigate these ailments, they are still constants that I’m working on.

This is something that is very common for Black folk. We “make it look good” – keeping up appearances because the only thing more popular that an underdog story is an Icarus story. I do many things that feed my spirit but aren’t financially viable. I also do a lot of things that help pay the bills but drain me emotionally. So I’m working towards balance.

Contact Info:

Image Credits
Frankie Boxguy Rivera

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