Short Stories of My Life

Chapter 1: The Quiet Spark

My story starts with a little sparkle—and a sunbeam.

This isn’t a “woe is me” story. It could’ve been much worse.

I’m fortunate in more ways than I’ll ever know.

While my story isn’t the traditional path to success, it led me here anyway.

I remember that day. The sun pouring through the second-floor apartment window like it was auditioning for a fairy tale. The beams caught on paint chips scattered across our kitchen floor, splitting into shadows, making tiny mountains and valleys that I traced with my fingers while I whispered stories to my imaginary friends.

I didn’t know what the day meant. I just knew I had my mom all to myself—and that was everything.

There was nervous energy in the air. My mom was readying the house, doing that magical thing she always did—turning not enough into just right.

I could feel her pulse, her pride, her pressure.

I didn’t talk much that day.

I played.

I watched the light.

I listened.

Then came Mr. Tall Man in his gray suit.

Kind. Handsome. Curious.

There to evaluate me:

Was I ready for preschool?

My mom must’ve held her breath through the whole thing.

I didn’t know what passing meant.

I just knew I had a role to play.

I don’t like to talk to people.

I didn’t like to let go of my mom.

But I did what she needed me to do.

They talked while I played—about my speech, my imagination, my problem-solving, my spirit.

I don’t remember what I said.

But I remember the sun.

And I remember what it felt like to get in.

The first in my family to go to preschool.

The pride—maybe relief—I saw on my mom’s face when he left?

That was a high I never forgot.

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My life started in a home that most would’ve called empty.

A one-bedroom apartment for five of us: Mom, Dad, and three girls.

There wasn’t much.

Not in the fridge.

Not on the walls.

There weren’t really even shelves to hold junk.

But somehow, we filled it.

With chaos, yes—but with color, noise, and above all: belief.

My mom taught us that even if today is hard, tomorrow can still sparkle.

She taught us how to make magic out of nothing.

And we believed.

We all did.

I didn’t have a bedroom—I slept on the couch.

But that didn’t matter.

Not when your dreams are good.

Eventually, we moved out of that apartment and into my grandmother’s home.  The clutter intensified significantly.  But I got an office – even if it was a closet.

This wasn’t your “converted into a cozy nook” kind of closet.  It was a “move the coats and sit under a massive purple hemp lamp” kind. It had a brown desk—plastic, but proud. And it was mine.

I don’t know how they got that desk, or that lamp.

Maybe a trade, maybe pulled from someone else’s trash.

Never mattered, because it was perfect.

For me, it started as a teacher’s desk.

Then it became a secretary’s desk.

Eventually? It was the boss’s desk.

Because I made the calls.

And yes—I had a secretary.

She was invisible. But very capable.

That closet was everything.

My Hogwarts.

My Silicon Valley.

My sanity.

I went there to play.

To plan.

To quiet the world—and sometimes to hide from it.

Before I ever knew what strategy was, I was building empires out of string and cardboard.

I made spiderweb obstacle courses across entire rooms.

I built box forts with check-in stations and official titles.

If you stepped into one of my games, you better be ready to follow protocol.

I didn’t care how I looked—my curly hair had its own personality.

I wasn’t great at eye contact.

And I was definitely the kid clutching her mom’s leg at any event with more than five people.

But when I was playing?

I owned the room.

I was the ringleader of a circus only I could see.

I had imaginary friends, big plans, long stories.

I talked to myself in mirrors while pounding buttons on an adding machine whose ink tape tangled into my hair.

I was given scraps—and turned them into systems.

Teachers handed me their leftover worksheets at the end of the year.

Friends gave me broken phones, junked fax machines, cast-off equipment from the traveling circus we couldn’t afford to attend.

One relative worked at Playskool and sent us a whole crate of misfit toys: G.I. Joes, whiteboards, water tables.

They weren’t new.

They were better.

They gave me tools.

They gave me language.

They gave me possibility.

I didn’t know it then—but I was being built.

By hand.

By scarcity.

By imagination.

By love.

By leftovers.

I’m not the loudest.

But I see things.

Systems. Patterns. Cracks.

And maybe I’m not the loudest…

Until I am.

But that spark?

The one that doesn’t wait for applause?

It started it that kitchen.

It survived poverty, grief, noise, burnout.

It learned to whisper when shouting didn’t work.

It never went out.

That spark?

It’s mine.

And it’s undeniable.

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