In her story telling workshops renown spoken word artist Minton Sparks poses the old question, Where are you from? in a provocative new way.
We typically answer with our home city or state. I spent most of life in Ohio but I am more truly a Californian. But, Sparks locates the question not in physical places but in the people and experiences that shaped us.
In this way I am from my Los Angeles childhood & the eucalyptus tree that soared skyward from the corner of our backyard & I am from the mother who hung out wash in the everyday sun & fluttered fresh sheets down upon my four year old self as she put me to bed amid the scent of the lemon tree outside my window.
I am from my father's Hollywood YMCA where I spent every Saturday swimming, playing chess & watching my dad play handball from the small stands above the court. I am from the man who would pause between points, glance up at me & smile like the sunshine. And I am from the dad who was almost killed on that same handball court when he reached for a shot, struck the back wall & fell into a seven-day coma.
I am from the older sister who helped raise me, my first friend Jill & the younger sister who never grew in a typical way but soared as tall in spirit as the eucalyptus tree in the backyard.
Sparks' exercise expands our consciousness. It enlarges our sense of what helped shape us & thus informs the soul of who we are today.
For caregivers, this is crucial. Every patient becomes more than admission sheet data & diagnosis. As someone more than that their humanity blooms.
Match your heritage with your patient & you enrich your sacred encounter with that vulnerable person in need.
Where are you from?
-Erie Chapman
Photographs: "Minton Sparks Live," and "With Dad, 1945"
Journal of Sacred Work 
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