Maybe it wasn’t about rejection after all — As she walked out of her home leaving both it and her husband behind he handed her a bottle of wine and told her to Be happy. She took the bottle and left dumbfounded. That was it? No please stay? No what can I do to keep you? She slipped…

An empty nest, a cancer-riddled friend & an affair — For most of her marriage, her voice remained plugged up inside her. She hadn’t always been this way. As a child, she spoke her mind. Curiosity and questions poured out of her on a daily basis. Her husband neither appreciated nor nurtured that side of her. It rattled his need…

Curiosity is the spark behind my spark // Updated August 2023 — I’ve always been intensely curious. I’m curious about the world around me, the world inside me, and the world inside others. I love to hear people’s stories — how they got from point A to point B, why they do the things they do and think the things they think. …

Will it ever forget? — “When did you first think about leaving Dad?” My son asked me this question as we sat around the kitchen table in my new apartment. I’d moved out a few weeks before this conversation took place. “To be honest? Fifteen years ago.” “Oh, that would’ve been bad,” he replied. “I…

From the lens of kasey sparks — November has been a challenging month for me. A traumatic family event at the end of October kept me from writing and editing as much as I usually do. This week we reached a more stable place which gave me a small window of time to scrounge up some photos…

When the one who used to be my caregiver becomes my care-receiver — The skin on the back of her neck is held together with staples covered over with an opaque plastic neck brace. One wrist sports a white cast while the other one is wrapped up tight in a tan-colored splint. Her left hip lays waiting to heal under a mint green…

Reshaping the stories that circulate in our heads — All of us are storytellers. Some of us craft creative works of fiction. Some of us draw from a deep well of personal experiences and spill those words into the page. Others employ photos or poetic prose to tell their stories. All of these hold weight in revealing who we…

November Six Word Photo Story Challenge: “Happiness” — Seeing smiley faces makes me happy. Over my childhood bed hung a Holly Hobbie plaque with the message, The time to be happy is now. I didn’t grasp the concept back then, but as I reflect on it today the message is about living in the present moment. It’s a reminder to be happy today —…

It grew into a ritual that birthed much-needed healing — With her divorce looming in the future and her affair partner now absent from her life, she cocooned herself inside her small apartment despite the lively summer season in full bloom just outside her door. During a string of hot July days, the temps in her apartment rose and the…