New Year's A-Coming

I can't wait for the new year to start. I have big plans at work, big plans in my life, big plans for the blog...

Right now, I'm signed up for several classes. The blogging one (see the button on the right hand side of the blog), a lettering workshop with Joanne Sharpe, a Kelly Kilmer art journaling class and a storytelling class from Ali Edwards. None of the start yet and I am ITCHING to start.  I'm just feeling full of energy and excitement for moving forward.

Good clean fun.

Visiting My Tribe

I had an opportunity to visit with some of my friends tonight - some of them, I see pretty regularly, some I see occasionally and some rarely. These are the people I share my history with, my profession, my gaffes, my missteps and my stories. They are my tribe - or at least the core of it.  We have blown to different areas, living our lives, but still a strong thread holds us in formation and a slight pull moves us all toward the middle for brief periods.

I realized tonight that storytelling is like using a foreign language - you lose your fluency if you don't do it very often. I felt rusty tonight. Rusty like my interpreting feels sometimes.  I'm hoping to change that in both arenas - I just need to practice both more often.

It was a good evening.

Reverb 10 - Day 8: BEAUTIFULLY DIFFERENT

December 8 – Beautifully Different. Think about what makes you different and what you do that lights people up. Reflect on all the things that make you different – you’ll find they’re what make you beautiful. (Author: Karen Walrond)

Once I discover the answers to this prompt, I can probably stop writing this blog. I believe this is one of the primary questions people have in their lives and I am certainly no different.  I did come up with several things that came easily to mind.

What makes me different:  I love bright colors - the brighter, the better. I love having bright colors around me. I would love to have piles and piles of neon colored crayons and have furniture that was neon colored.  My car is bright, sunny, crayon yellow.  Neon pink is another favorite color.  When I was a kid, I colored everything in what my family called, "multi-colored stripes" - even my Santa Claus in first grade was divided up and colored in strips.  People don't understand how colors affect me. My theory is that the colors and the visual stimulation helps to stabilize my brain which is buzzing all around all the time. It is sort of the same theory people use when they explain why they drink hot coffee in the hottest parts of summer - it stabilizes their temperature. Colors and visual stimulation actually calm my brain.

What I do that lights people up:  I am a storyteller. I am trying to recapture that in my writing, but right now, my talent lies in sitting around with people and telling stories - funny stories about myself, my experiences. When Roby was still alive, we did what we called "tandem storytelling" - we would take turns adding onto the story the other one was telling. We could do it for hours and everyone was in hysterics by the time the evening was over. When he died, there was a long time when I didn't really feel I could tell the stories in the same way - I was missing the other half of the formula that made it beautiful. Slowly, I took ownership of my own stories.  One of my favorite things is when friends come to town and we all get together for an evening.  Almost everyone in the group is a phenomenal storyteller, so we take turns making requests of our favorite stories the other people tell. There is nothing better than laughing with friends until your cheeks and sides ache.   

Quote and Heads Down

So, I was cleaning my office today. It is quite a chore - we moved into the "new" office more than a year ago, but I never stopped running long enough to unpack everything. My office is filled with boxes that I haven't even opened and I just got tired of it. Today I opened a few - I didn't make much progress, but I did find a bunch of notebooks and things I was using to try to be a better documentor. Hopefully, they will help.
Among the paperwork, I also found a book I had bought at Starbucks (before they laid off my friend). The book is titled "One: How many people does it take to make a difference?" and I found this little thing inside. It resonated. There was no resource, so I don't know who to credit other than the little Starbucks book. Here is the story:

Two Wolves

A Cherokee elder was teaching his children about life.
He said to them, “A terrible fight is going on inside me. It is a fight between two wolves. One is the wolf of joy, love, hope, kindness, and compassion. The other is the wolf of fear, anger, cynicism, indifference and greed. The same fight is going on inside of you and every other person too.” The children thought about it for a moment and then one child asked, “Which wolf will win?” The elder replied, “Whichever one you feed.”

I just thought this was a really simple and beautiful expression of something that I know.  Don't feed the beast.  It is so easy to go there sometimes. 

I have ben keeping my head down and feeding fear a little in the last few days since I got my "unfriendly" comment.  I have been thinking about it a lot and about what I want to do here on the blog and the voice I have or have not found.  It has been fascinating to realize what an impact something so small can have.  I guess I should really be thankful that the person took the time to tell me. I think there are always opportunities for growth - even when it stings a bit.

Anyway, it's all good.  I am excited for October because I had decided to do some "Four Word" stuff and I think that will be fun. I haven't done a theme in a long time and I find that challenging sometimes.  Should be a good month! Starting tomorrow - can you believe it?

Living on an Island

Today, I was having a conversation with someone where I expressed my aversion to interactions with humans who I don't know and the person said to me, "You need to go live on an island somewhere."  It seemed to me, even in that moment that they were thinking that I didn't like/want ANY human interaction. That's not entirely the case - I just don't want to interact with people I don't know in an artificial and uncontrolled manner - such as cashiers who want to talk to me all day or people in line who want to tell me their life story.  I have a magnet that draws people to me who are not necessarily the folks I want to have in my inner circle, if you know what I mean.

I thought about it for a while, though, and I do think that a month off in some deserted location with very little to do and very few people to come into contact with could definitely do me some good. I am in introvert with extroverted tendencies. What this means is that I can be around people and I can manage and maintain, but it really takes all the energy I have to keep it up for long periods of time. To quote my six-year-old self, "It's hard to be good all day." Smiling and nodding and trying to see everyone's point of view all the time is exhausting - it always has been for me. I don't feel that I'm being disingenuous, I am actually pretty good in people-oriented situations, but again, it takes a lot of energy.

When I was a freelance interpreter, lots of crazy things happened that I could make into some funny story, so often, the way that I coped was to tell a funny story. It breaks the tension, it allows me to breathe for a minute - stories come as naturally as breathing to me. Now, I work in an office with all the same people. They are busy doing what they do and I am busy doing what I do. The work is confidential on all sides and it seems to have removed that mechanism for me.

Another thing about stories - often, stories mock the storyteller. When I was younger, I was okay with the kind of self-depreciation that comes with really funny, edgy storytelling. After awhile, I started to shy away from giving that power to people. If you tell them a story about yourself and expose a weakness or a sensitivity, it often comes back to haunt you. Also, I realized that I wasn't always being painted in a good light - whether I deserved that or not. Sometimes because I did a not-so-smart thing or made a decision at 25 years old that I certainly wouldn't make now. The stories are still funny and they are a part of who I am, but I am more cautious about who I share them with.

The other thing that stops me from telling stories is that I don't necessarily have shared history with some of the people I am around regularly. Shared history provides so much context. Telling a story without shared history or at least shared experiences or parallel experiences is like having to explain why a joke is funny to a different culture. It doesn't work. Sometimes it might, but it would take so long to give the back story that it hardly seems worth it.

Anyway, I would love to go to an island for a month and read and listen to music and do art and maybe just sit and stare out at the water and listen to the waves. I could definitely handle that.

Profound Words about Truth

I found this video at Jamie Ridler Studios yesterday.  I love a good storyteller and I love a good teacher and I love theatre...when all three are combined, you can't lose.  This is Patsy Rodenburg in a piece titled, "Why I Do Theatre".  Thanks for posting this, Jamie!



**Seriously? Now the YouTube videos don't fit on the template? I can't catch a break! I am trying to figure out how to make it SMALLER, not BIGGER. I know enough to get myself into trouble and not enough to get myself out, apparently.

We are Our Stories

"A human being is nothing but a story with skin around it." ~Fred Allen

Isn't that a great quote?  I guess this month's theme should have been STORIES.  I have been thinking about stories quite a bit, so I guess that is why these quotes resonate with me.

One interesting thing that I have noticed as I get older is that many stories that we tell about ourselves showcase ways that we were not at our best - it may be humorous, but definitely not our most shining moments.  I have been trying to come to terms with that because when you tell a story like that, especially if it is humorous, you have to commit to it. You can't hesitate or worry that people will think less of you for behaving badly.  

I noticed over time that I have become more cautious about the stories I tell. I'm sure this is just a part of "maturing" and it is influenced by some of the roles I play in my life.  

One of the things I miss most about Roby was what his family called "tandem storytelling". We used to regale his family with stories that one of us would start and the other would augment. Having both perspectives with both of us finishing each other's sentences made the stories so much funnier.  These are the stories that I want to record - since my storytelling partner is no longer here, I don't want to forget a moment of them.

I feel very fortunate, as I have many stories and have had many storytelling partners over time. Roby was a brilliant storyteller - we were well-matched in that way. I have known other brilliant storytellers - when we get together, we laugh so hard our cheeks and sides ache.  I miss that. Hopefully, we can get together and laugh soon. 

My Universe, Anyway

"The Universe is made up of stories, not atoms." ~ Muriel Rukeyser               (Quote from "Juicy Pens Thirsty Paper" by SARK)

One of the greatest lessons from my fabulous telecourse was about how story defines us, how we can change our story.  The funny thing was that somewhere DEEP DEEP DEEP inside, I already knew that. I have always known that...but I didn't BELIEVE it.

I remember telling stories about things when I was very small and I remember the reaction that my stories, my noticing, got from the people who most mattered to me in the world. They were amazed and amused by my ability to story. When I was first in school, I wrote a "book" that amazed teachers and parents alike with the beginning, middle and end - apparently, children of that age don't usually have that ability (at least in writing). I always knew that I was a writer. I never said I was going to be a writer - I was going to be a teacher. I was born a writer. I was born a reader. I was born a storyteller and a story gatherer. 

For a brief period of time, I had an acquaintance who was a "storyteller" and I always thought I would love a job like that...there is nothing in the world like the rapt faces of people waiting for the next moment of a story - whether adult or child, it doesn't matter.  There is something so magical about the way we relate to each other through a story, through a turn of phrase, through a tiny bit of humanity. I love that. I miss it.

I realized that there are so many moments that live only in our heads. For me, those things will fade. The things that stay in my memory are the things I storied. The things I told myself in story or told someone else. One of my goals last year was to start to write my Roby stories down. I don't talk about them as much and I am afraid those stories will lose their color, their humor, their humanity. They are, in fact, some of the best stories of my life. Some because we were young and foolish, some because we had such an intense relationship borne out of secrecy and fear and some because we had some incredibly funny moments together. 

So, when I read the quote above in SARK's book, I knew I had to write about it. Also, a special thanks to "Life Unfolds " by way of Swirly Girl for leading me back to SARK. I have all of her books but I haven't READ one in a long time.  I was reading Swirly Girl's "Five Things" and that led me to "Life Unfolds" and to SARK, where I got the quote at the beginning of the post and a couple of others that may show up here in the next few days.

P.S. There is something wrong with Blogger - I have been hotlinking SARK, Swirly Girl and the Life Unfolds blogs and it isn't saving. I will get that fixed as soon as possible.