Story cw

 Vicki, your comments, in our conversations as well as written, has me looking at how I want to share my thoughts, especially in this blog, though also the family Facebook page I’m part of.  It also has me reaffirming what we shared yesterday about our thinking and goals (if we want to use that word) have, and are, evolving for our effort.

Today, I’ll tell “Story” in hopes people’s thinking and memories will respond. I know it will influence our phone visits!  Part of this I shared on Facebook a few weeks ago.

And, it is a longer post than what either of us usually write. 😊

The elevation at Idol City (those mining claims of my childhood) is six thousand feet so there was always a chance of frost at night and a rapid chill whenever the sun went behind a cloud. In my memory I hear the crackle of the fire in both the cook stove and in the heating stove, which stood in the middle of the bedroom, burning in the evenings when we needed its warmth against the chill mountain air. We used pine, fir and, especially for cooking heat, mountain mahogany. Toasty warmth as my eyes grew heavy with sleepiness, water heating in wash pans and tea kettle for the dishes and, of course, lamplight - in later years a Coleman gas lantern hanging from a nail so Mom could better see. The scent of tobacco from Granddad and Dad's pipes as they planned for the work ahead, the sound of Granddad’s voice as he told a story - how he could tell stories!

It was there I began to learn the importance of “Story” ~ especially those stories which teach us about who or what we are.

Years later that lesson came home, and I became particularly aware of Story’s power as a group of family members gathered in a restaurant after my aunt’s death. As “Aunt Angie” stories began to be told, the richness of Story washed over and around us and I realized how important hearing them was ~ to all of us. We didn’t come together often, some of us had met only a few times, but as the river of memories circled and embraced us, I realized through Story, we were able to be family, bound together through the ties of love and memory. We were able to laugh and grieve. Story not only bound us together but helped us experience closure as we honored her life through our shared memories.

For me there was added the richness of experiencing how Granddad’s talent for telling stories has come down through the generations for at least three of his descendants have, each in their own unique way, inherited Clyde’s ability to weave spells through their gift of storytelling. “How rich we are!” I thought as I felt the spell of their story telling weaving around me that wonderful evening.

Since then I’ve come to see how hungry others often are for a sense of connection and belonging which can only come from knowing who they are which is best known through knowing their family’s Story.

My sense of how important it is for people to have that sense of belonging, of knowing “where they came from” gained clarity during a family dinner as we sat, eating and talking. Our children were grown ~ all, at least out of high school ~ and we always gathered, monthly or oftener, for a time of “family.” The conversation that day turned to friends of theirs struggling with a variety of troubles, marital and legal.

“They don’t know who they are, they grew up so far away from extended family, they have no grounding” was their response when I asked why their friends were struggling. “Why is it different for you?” I asked, “We moved you up here, away from your grandparents, aunts and uncles ~ just like your friends?” My children seemed grounded to me ~ focused, certainly not having any work or legal troubles. The four pointed to the “ancestor pictures” covering the wall of our dining area, “We know who we are,” they said, “because of those pictures ~ not just the pictures ~ we know their stories.”

That conversation was a beginning impetus for me to write ~ and, here we are today😊