A Life Worth Listening To

I’ve always been fascinated by people—what makes them tick, what they carry, and how their stories unfold.

My first job after university was in IT, automating a production line. Because computers were expensive and labour was cheap, system development had to wait until after 4 p.m. So I started late and stayed late, spending my mornings preparing for testing and my afternoons with code. But the unexpected gift of that job came from the people I met on the factory floor.

There was the refugee from the Middle East, once a schoolteacher in her homeland, now working a machine because her qualifications weren’t recognised here. Or the paramedic who left his job due to PTSD and retrained as an electrician. What drew me to them wasn’t just their stories, but their courage—the quiet resilience required to keep going when life veers off course.

Later, while studying theology, I drove taxis during the summer—not because it paid well (it didn’t), but because I loved the unfiltered glimpses into people’s lives. So many passengers would begin with silence and end with confession: life stories, many marked by loss, shared with a stranger they’d never see again. “I don’t know why I’m telling you this,” they’d say. “Maybe because I’ll never meet you again.”

Years ago, I asked my parents to write their life stories. They declined—“Nothing interesting ever happened to us,” they said. But I suspected others might hear that same protest from their parents, so I developed a community memoir course. We expected a handful to show up. Instead, over four years, more than a hundred people joined us. Many went on to self-publish their stories. My parents were among them, eventually completing small memoirs for their grandchildren—quiet legacies wrapped in humility.

Lately, this fascination with people and their stories has taken a new shape. I’ve volunteered to write the life story of someone receiving palliative care. I’ll take some time and sit with them—listen, reflect, and help craft the shape of their life on the page. It’s not a project. It’s a privilege.

So, who would I like to talk to soon? That person. A stranger, for now. But someone with a story. A life worth listening to. And I’m looking forward to hearing every word.

I’ve always been drawn
to people like pages
half-turned—
stories tucked into silence.

In the factory
she worked the production line
but once taught poetry
in another language,
in another life.

In the taxi
they told me things
they hadn’t told their children.
“Because I won’t see you again,”
they’d say,
and then begin.

My parents said
there was nothing to write down.
But they did.
They gave it shape,
for the grandchildren.

Now—
I’ll sit beside a stranger
with notepads and time,
ready to ask,
ready to listen.

Because even quiet lives
are never small.
They are worth the ink.
Worth being heard.
Worth being known.