I believe self-honesty is the best form of truth there is, and in this mode of introspection, I’ve discovered something about myself. I like to talk—a lot. Hours and hours on end. When not talking, I write—a lot. So in kind regard to my audience, I have decided to spare them a novel in the form of a blog, and break down my posts into parts, when I’d like to continue the discussion, but not ruin anyone’s eyes in staring at the computer screen too long.
Anyhoo, to get back on topic. What is a story? Seems like a simple enough question. If you asked most people to define it, they might say it’s something written down, usually in a book. This intrigues me, because no one ever seems to realize the full magnitude of what a story is. For me, stories are life. What do I mean? Well, if you paid attention, you’d realize that at almost all times, you are surrounded by stories. From the television, whether it’s the news providing you with “factual” stories (I placed quotes around factual, as I sometimes have my doubts on this), or your favorite show, which is a story played out by actors. If you take public transportation, inevitably you’ll overhear some type of story, usually of some drama. Depending on the location (like rolling through questionable neighborhoods, with questionable characters) you might even get a good fight story, where the teller always gets the upper-hand (it’s funny to me, how when you listen to people talking about fights they’re in, they usually are always right, and generally win; like no one wants to admit about how they got their ass kicked). If your ride the train, especially in NYC at one point (and for the entertainment factor-hopefully many), you’ll either be a part of, or witness drama in action, which of course you’ll recount later to a friend, significant other, or some form of kin, with the opening “Man do I got a story to tell you!”
Buses and trains aside, if you’ve ever worked in an office (which thank the stars above, I have managed to extricate myself, out of that nonsense) you’ve heard and most likely participated in the proverbial office gossip. This is generally a story about someone else business, why so-and-so is a bitch, why that weird dude in the office won’t stop showing his ass-crack, and put his goddamn shoes on in the office (true story on my part), and any other matters deemed scintillating.
But the point is, if you looked all around you, from music, to movies, to real life drama, you’d realize that stories are everywhere, so thoroughly embedded in the everyday fabric of our lives, that we hardly notice them. Stories are in everything. Stories are in you. You are a story—with a traditional beginning, middle and end. Even your very being is encoded with a story. Your deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA for the non-informed) is a code of a story that goes back to the beginning of humanity. It is the story of your eyes, that were the eyes of your mother, your grandmother, and generations of mothers and fathers who carried them. It is why you are short, tall, fat, curvy, skinny, light, dark, funny, not funny, loud, speak like a mouse, musical, quirky, crazy and the billions of other details that go into making you—you. And whether that story is complex, good, bad, dramatic or boring as hell, it makes no difference. It is a story all the same.
confessionsofaliterarygoddess 