Why I Built Wishes & Stories

Then someone we love dies, and suddenly it isn't distant at all.

According to a 2023 Article, fewer than half of American adults have any formal end-of-life plan in place. That means the majority of families are left making deeply personal decisions — about services, about wishes, about how someone wants to be remembered — with little more than guesswork to guide them. I've seen what that looks like up close. And I've seen the alternative.

Two experiences that stayed with me

Multiple times in my life I witnessed a family lose someone far too soon. There was no plan, no roadmap, no record of what that person had wanted. The grief alone was overwhelming — and yet the people who loved them most were suddenly responsible for making every decision, from the practical to the deeply personal. They had to choose an officiant for the service, someone who had never met the person they were being asked to honor. In a world where fewer and fewer families have a longtime connection to a church or faith community, this is more common than most people realize. The officiant did their best. But you could feel what was missing.

Conversely, I had a completely different experience with my grandfather. My grandfather lived well into his nineties, and for more than fifty years he had been a member of the same church, with a pastor who took time to get to know him. In the final years of his life, I had the privilege of sitting with him during visits where he and his pastor would simply talk — about his life, his faith, his memories, what mattered to him, how he hoped to be remembered.

When my grandfather passed, his pastor stood and spoke about him with a confidence and intimacy that truly reflected who he was. He didn't just know the facts of my grandfather's life. He knew the man. The service felt like a true reflection of who my grandfather was, because it was.

That stayed with me.

What I wanted to build

Not everyone has fifty years in the same church. Not everyone has a pastor who has walked alongside them through decades of life. But everyone deserves the kind of service my grandfather had — one that reflects who they actually were, told with honesty and warmth by someone who truly understands them.

That's why I built Wishes & Stories.

It's a simple, guided experience that walks you through the questions that matter — your life, your family, your values, your wishes, and how you want to be remembered. When you're done, it generates a document you can share with the people you love, so they're never left guessing. And when the time comes, that document can be shared with an officiant — whether they knew you for decades or are meeting your story for the first time — so they can speak about you the way you deserved to be spoken about.

It won't replace a lifetime of relationship. But it can give the people who love you something real to hold onto. And it can give whoever stands up to honor you the words to do it right.

That feels worth building.