stories

i read this to my family two nights ago...

"The most powerful and influential position in any society is that of the storyteller. Storytellers are not just the mythical cultural icons who dress up on Thursday afternoons and read stories to your children in local libraries and bookstores. Musicians are storytellers; politicians are storytellers. Screenplay writers and business leaders are storytellers. Teachers, preachers, nurses, lawyers, priests, scientists, salespeople, artists, mothers, fathers, poets, philosophers, brothers, sisters, babysitters, grandparents...we are all storytellers.

The future belongs to the storytellers and it belongs to us. What will it be like? Well, that depends very much on the stories we tell, the stories we listen to, and the stories we live."
(from Rediscover Catholicism, p. 136)

there was more, but that's the gist of it. and it's something i've been thinking a lot about the last couple of days.

yesterday, in my religious ed class, my thirdborn wrote this on a piece of paper he put on a poster for the souls we were remembering on all souls' day..."jeanni...she died of cancer, surrounded by friends and family." i often feel that emotionally, i have gone over to the dark side. or if that's too dramatic, i've definitely gone over to the whiny, self-centered side. but somehow he learned that story. the picture he drew was sad but peaceful. sad faces, but a slight smile on jeanni's face. it was kind of crazy. like i was looking at a picture from a story that was so beautiful. and then i was like, "hey! that's me in that story...i remember..." a couple of the kids in my class stated that they couldn't participate because no one had ever died in their families. after pointing out that yes, someone has died unless their family has the secret to eternal life on earth, they clarified that they'd never KNOWN anyone who died. and i was surprised that they hadn't heard any stories of those they didn't know...those who went before them. my oldest son loves to tell his younger brothers about an uncle he knew that they were too young to remember. i can tell it makes him feel connected to the past in a way he doesn't understand but still feels compelled by. i tell them stories of my grandmother that helped raise me. i caught myself telling them a story about a grandfather that died when i was five months old...so i was handing down a story i'd been told because i never knew him either.

anyway, this is what's been on my mind lately...well, when it's not screaming in frustration, anger, exhaustion...but that's a story for another day.

peace