Dear friends: I wrote "Sparks" in 2003. The timing was strange and a little sad. I wrote the song in my head, while riding my bicycle home, over four successive nights in late January and early February. I was engaged to be married to the love of my life, and I wanted to write a song that brought in threads of our shared Judaism and the passion I felt when I looked into my beloved's eyes. My father, who lived across town from us, had been in poor health for months. I was between jobs, and rode back and forth to his house two to three days a week -- 16 milee round trip -- to clear away his breakfast dishes, read or talk with him, and make sure he had what he needed before heading home again after we'd had lunch together. I did this every week for about a month and a half. His partner of twenty years would then come home and take care of him in the evening. I'd last seen my father outside of his home a week earlier, on my 40th birthday. He sat on our piano bench, leaning against his cane; years of heart disease and diabetes had taken their toll on his tall, heavy body and his eyes showed a weariness, even as he smiled and seemed to enjoy himself at my birthday party. It was the last time he left his house to go anywhere. The following Monday, I'd ridden over in the rain and we'd enjoyed a lovely morning together, eating cheese sandwiches and studying some Jewish text together. I had errands to run tha afternoon and did not return home until early that evening. On that ride home, I finished the song in my head. When I got home, I wrote it out and played it for my fiance, who loved it. We decided to go out to a cheap movie that night. When we came home, we received word that my father had died only an hour before. He'd been sitting on his bed getting ready to go to sleep, and was listening to an operatic aria on his radio when his heart suddenly stopped. He had sighed loudly, fallen back on the bed and was gone in seconds. He probably felt little or no pain. In the sad, hectic days that followed, my sister and I rallied around our father's partner and cried many tears, and each of us held the arms of our significant others tightly as we walked through the grief of losing our second and last parent. Meanwhile, I felt surrounded by so much love -- Dad and B's love that they had shared for two decades; the love between my sister and her husband; and the love between me and my fiance. After the traditional thirty days of mourning had passed and I was ready to play music again, I played "Sparks" over and over again and took comfort from it. Love comes in many ways and sometimes sneaks up on us. And when we recognize the sparks of love and light in the world around us, we are blessed, and we can be blessings in turn. In a world filled with violence and fear, we must remember that each of us contains a divine spark and that part of our job in this life is recognize that spark in each other, so we will treat each other with kindness and learn to live together in peace. The song "Sparks", currently # 21 for folk songs on the NumberOneMusic charts, is on my latest recording, "Ten Miles"; and can be heard at CDBaby, iTunes and oySongs.com. Take a listen, and enjoy. http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/bethhamon4 Thanks for supporting Jewish music Made By Hand. Peace --Beth