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Testimonials
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"In June of 2017, my husband of 57 years won his long battle with Parkinson’s Disease, a peaceful end to the hard years that often come with terminal disease. But how was I to refocus on the good years that preceded decline and loss? My daughter suggested I call Kathy Englert, a personal historian who helps people capture the complicated web of someone’s life. Twelve months after I first contacted Kathy, I hold in my hand a beautiful 8 x 10 book that fleshes out memories that deal with life’s triumphs as well as the challenges.
Kathy has a gift for capturing what is unique in each person’s story. Under her prompting, I spent many hours in front of a recorder, drifting back and forth in time to revisit highlights of the past 79 years. A natural storyteller, Kathy translated my spoken words into print. She probed just deep enough to uncover unique experiences without intruding into private spaces best left behind. Creating someone’s personal history requires teamwork. I found the process both intense and rewarding. Revisiting certain experiences reminded me of disappointment and loss. It also offered a chance to enjoy once again adventure, success and satisfying relationships. Thanks to Kathy’s talent for making someone else’s life come alive in print, I can now revisit my own family history, childhood, marriage, parenting, and aging. I am grateful to my daughter for suggesting I refocus attention away from loss toward a celebration of life." |
~Pickett (client)
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"Kathy’s work with my mother turned out to be a wonderful gift to me. She met with my mother a few months after my father died. The conversations provided my mother space and vehicle to reflect on the meaning of her life at a time of deep contemplation. Better than any psychologist or grief counselor. She then wove them together through writing that captured my mothers voice – but organized it into a coherent story line.
Kathy made my mother feel so comfortable that she ended up sharing many stories from her early life that no one else in the family had ever heard. Many were from some hard times I never knew about. But they helped me understand my mother better." ~Katharine (client's daughter)
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"Thank you for the fantastic job you did with my life story. My family members were surprised that it is so thorough! I had thought the cover would be thinner. It is a REAL book cover! I enjoyed meeting you."
~Edith (client)
"The in-person interviews were the highlight of the process for my mom. She thoroughly enjoyed her conversations with Kathy."
~Beth (client's daughter)
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My son decided to hire Kathy Englert to author my personal history. At age 88, I had only to agree. I said yes mainly to honor his wishes, but also to preserve in book form the contents of over 25 years of interviews that I had recorded with family members, my growing digital archive of over 150 years of family photographs, and many remembered family stories. Prior to our interviews, I organized all this information into a chronological outline and also completed Kathy’s questionnaire, resulting in reference materials that assisted us both as we walked together through my family history. As I prepared these materials, things I had forgotten long ago came flooding back in. Even more memories poured in during our 12 hours of interviews as Kathy posed questions about the events of my life as well as important national and world events of that time. Then Kathy organized the content from our interviews into a 150-page manuscript. After some back-and-forth editing, the content was complete, at which point Kathy inserted about 100 of my photographs into appropriate locations in the text, helping the places, events, and people who were subjects in my history come alive.
In retrospect, this personal history would never have been completed without my son’s request that it be done and without Kathy’s efforts. Although I had collected much of the material for its construction, it just was not going to get done without help. The final book is an assemblage of people, events, goals, feelings, adventures, beliefs, pictures, loves, wisdom, works, accomplishments, allegiances, philosophies, errors, relationships, and sorrows, along with some successes, and hopefully, some guidance for future generations of my family. Without the book and its construction, these happenings would have become poorly defined, unrelated, and easily forgotten memories for me, but they are in print now and I am enjoying the ease with which I can tap back into them. I pick up my book often and re-read parts of it because the text and pictures emphasize and remind me of such things as the strong contributions of family and of the many decisions that led to the here and now. Kathy’s important contributions came from her careful attention to detail, her thoughtful, expressive use of the English language, and her creative feel for arranging subject matter. As a result of her hard work, deep listening skills, instincts about human nature, and detailed knowledge of my life gained through her excellent interview technique, she was able to recognize and connect many seemingly insubstantial dots. In turn, these insights helped her write a more integrated story than I would have been able to write by myself. In a word, she was essential (for a time, an alter-ego) and I’m very grateful to her. To boot, throughout this effort, I enjoyed working with the warm, interesting person that she is. ~ Frank Packard
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Your Story Unfolded - Seattle, Washington - kathy@yourstoryunfolded.com - 206.391.2682
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