Lessons from Kathy

Here we are. None of us expected this—yet this is the hand we’ve been dealt. So here it goes.

This is a tribute to my friend, Kathy Hepinstall Parks. Before she was a great writer, she was a phenomenal human being. Great writers know how to live—and living was Kathy’s most powerful skill.

The grief of losing her dragged me through the bottom of a fast-moving river. I hit every rock, from one shore to the next. After days of wading through thoughts and memories—regrets, hopes, and aching questions—I came to realize this was a crossing I had to make alone.

To be honest, I didn’t know what to do. I tried journaling. I went on long walks with Milo, my dog—who always listens. And then, in that strange liminal space just before dawn, when you’re still asleep but your mind is starting to return from the current, an idea began to form. A task. A thing I could make. Something to occupy that dull ringing in my chest.