Poem /prayer by MAX COOTS at this time of year

My undergraduate degree in Theatre Arts is from what is now Webster University in metro Saint Louis. So much of what I do in my storytelling came from there even though I didn't see the path I would eventually follow. Paul Steger is the Dean of the Leigh Gerdine College of Fine Arts and he sent out the following poem or prayer for this time of year. Having recently lost a longtime friend, Loretta Vitek, who was both a storyteller and librarian (and mentioned here about half a dozen times) the poem or prayer seems particularly appropriate. Loretta's family this past month joined with those of us who will miss her in a memorial feast she would have approved. 

This seems to be a most appropriate way to enjoy those around us and " those friends now gone, like gardens past that have been harvested."

Photo by Philippe Murray-Pietsch on Unsplash

 

 

Poem /prayer by MAX COOTS

 

LET US GIVE THANKS

 

Let us give thanks for a bounty of people

For children who are our second planting

and though they grow like weeds

and the wind too soon blows them away,

May they forgive us our cultivation

and remember fondly where their roots are.

 

Let us give thanks:

For generous friends, with hearts as big as hubbards

and smiles as bright as their blossoms;

For feisty friends as tart as apples;

For continuous friends, who, like scallions and cucumbers,

keep reminding us we've had them;

For crotchety friends, as sour as rhubarb

and as indestructible;

For handsome friends, who are as gorgeous as eggplants

and as elegant as a row of corn,

and the others, as plain as potatoes and so good for you;

For funny friends, who are as silly as Brussels sprouts

and as amusing as Jerusalem artichokes,

and serious friends, as complex as cauliflowers

and as intricate as onions;

For friends as unpretentious as cabbages,

as subtle as summer squash,

as persistent as parsley,

as delightful as dill,

as endless as zucchini,

and who, like parsnips,

can be counted on to see you throughout the winter;

For old friends,

nodding like sunflowers in the evening-time

and young friends coming on as fast as radishes;

For loving friends, who wind around us like tendrils

and hold us, despite our blights, wilts, and witherings;

And finally, for those friends now gone,

like gardens past that have been harvested,

but who fed us in their times

that we might have life thereafter;

For all these we give thanks.

 

-- Max Coots

I find all over the internet this poem/prayer by the late Reverend Max Coots. Reverend Coots, was both a minister of the Unitarian Universalist Church and also a passionate gardener who permitted many to share these thoughts. 

Loretta and I shared a love of dragons. A few dragon stories may be found here attached to her name, but I also will long remember her signature not only about dragons, but "There's always a story; it would be a shame not to tell it."

For friends and all who shaped our stories, let us continue to give thanks.

Brown - The Young Dragon - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

Relevant to absolutely nothing other than my love and fascination with dragons, here is a literary story about a young dragon.  It comes from The Mermaid's Gift by Julia Brown.  Normally I prefer telling folk tales to something created by a specific author.  (Although I find a "retelling" is fine as it comes from the folk tradition, just as my own "retelling" does.)  The problem with literary tales is they seem to expect word for word relaying to convey the author's meaning.  I can find nothing about Brown other than another Public Domain book from 1925, The Enchanted Peacocks, and other stories.  That is close enough to "Mermaid's" 1912 edition and publisher, Rand McNally, so it  probably is the same author, although it has a different illustrator.  I can find nothing about her (and her fairly common name doesn't help).  Authors live through their books just as live storytellers live through their immediate effect upon an  audience.  The Ms Brown who wrote this story kept it simple enough to re-tell.

The book is illustrated by Maginel Wright Enright.  Her biography and images of her work is far easier to find.  The Internet Archive version of The Mermaid's Gift uses a different edition from the one I own.  It has a frontispiece not in my copy, but it doesn't have the opening image to the story.  I have copied my book to open the story.

I love the way the story stops in an open-ended way.  Of course the prince & princess live "happily ever after."  That is easily expected, but what about that young dragon and also that community of dragons divided between the Liberal and Conservative dragons?  The story cries out for more story creation!  

As you might imagine, I love bringing an audience to the point of story creation!!!   But be careful please, for as my friend and fellow storyteller and lover of dragons,

Loretta Vitek

loves to say:

  

 

 

Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for thou art crispy, and would be good with sauce!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

***********************

This is part of a series of postings of stories under the category, "Keeping the Public in Public Domain."  The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated.  I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20th century.  My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them.  I hope you enjoy discovering new stories.  

At the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an audience.  Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing of Public Domain stories will not occur that week.  This is a return to my regular posting of a research project here.  (Don't worry, this isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future storytelling to an audience.)  Response has convinced me that "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other postings as often as I can manage it.

Other Public Domain story resources I recommend-

• There are many online resources for Public Domain stories, maybe none for folklore is as ambitious as fellow storyteller, Yoel Perez's database, Yashpeh, the International Folktales Collection.  I have long recommended it and continue to do so.  He has loaded Stith Thompson's Motif Index into his server as a database so you can search the whole 6 volumes for whatever word or expression you like by pressing one key. http://folkmasa.org/motiv/motif.htm

• You may have noticed I'm no longer certain Dr. Perez has the largest database, although his offering the Motif Index certainly qualifies for those of us seeking specific types of stories.  There's another site, FairyTalez claiming to be the largest, with "over 2000 fairy tales, folktales, and fables" and they are "fully optimized for phones, tablets, and PCs", free and presented without ads.
  Between those two sites, there is much for story-lovers, but as they say in infomercials, "Wait, there's more!"

The email list for storytellers, Storytell, discussed Online Story Sources and came up with these additional suggestions:        

         - David K. Brown - http://people.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/stories.html

         - Karen Chace - http://karenchace.blogspot.com/search?q=public+domain

         - Richard Martin - http://www.tellatale.eu/tales_page.html

         - Spirit of Trees - http://spiritoftrees.org/featured-folktales

         - Story-Lovers - http://www.story-lovers.com/ is now only accessible through the Wayback Machine, described below, but the late Jackie Baldwin's wonderful site lives on there, fully searchable manually (the Google search doesn't work), at https://archive.org/ .  It's not easy, but go to Story-lovers.com snapshot for December 22 2016  and you can click on SOS: Searching Out Stories to scroll down through the many story topics and click on the story topic that interests you.

       - Tim Sheppard - http://www.timsheppard.co.uk/story/storylinks.html

       - World of Tales - http://www.worldoftales.com/ 

 
           - Zalka Csenge Virag - http://multicoloreddiary.blogspot.com doesn't give the actual stories, but her recommendations, working her way through each country on a continent, give excellent ideas for finding new books and stories to love and tell.

     
You're going to find many of the links on these sites have gone down, BUT go to the Internet Archive Wayback Machine to find some of these old links.  Tim's site, for example, is so huge probably updating it would be a full-time job.  In the case of Story-Lovers, it's great that Jackie Baldwin set it up to stay online as long as it did after she could no longer maintain it.  Possibly searches maintained it.  Unfortunately Storytell list member, Papa Joe is on both Tim Sheppard's site and Story-Lovers, but he no longer maintains his old Papa Joe's Traveling Storytelling Show website and his Library (something you want to see!) is now only on the Wayback Machine.  It took some patience working back through claims of snapshots but finally in December of 2006 it appears!

Somebody as of this writing whose stories can still be found by his website is the late Chuck Larkin - http://chucklarkin.com/stories.html.  I prefer to list these sites by their complete address so they can be found by the Wayback Machine, a.k.a. Archive.org, when that becomes the only way to find them.

You can see why I recommend these to you. 

Have fun discovering even more stories

Bailey - The Pie That Grew - Keeping the Public in Public Domain

Thanksgiving in 2020 definitely will be different.  Whether you call the current pandemic Coronavirus, Covid-19, just Covid, or even the overly cutsie 'Rona, it has brought changes and a new way of talking.  Personally I disagree with some terms, such as calling it "The New Normal" as it really should be called the "Temporary Normal."  While there may be some truth to saying we are keeping "Socially Distant", I believe, with the need to fight loneliness and depression, it would seem better to keep "Physically Distant."

Here in my area I'm seeing Christmas lights appear on houses already.  Usually that waited until the Thanksgiving weekend.  This may be due partially to a few unexpected but brief warm spells.  My bet is it's also an attempt to brighten what is looking like the start of a dark gloomy winter.  The holidays usually get the darkest time of the year off to a brighter start.  This year the question of how to enjoy them has become a major news item.

While "Physically Distant", families are figuring out ways to avoid truly being "Socially Distant."  Zoom calls, Facebook, Skype, even the good old telephone will be some of the ways to do this.  While I'm not eager to eat in a Zoom call and watch others eat, I do hope to have time for all my family to talk with each other.  I've already been asked to tell a story and maybe some of you will choose to tell a bit of family history.  I plan to tell the following story by Carolyn Sherwin Bailey and then see if we, as a group, can use it to make our own story.  I'll say more about that after her tale.

Some of you may be familiar with the idea of a Cumulative Story.  It means something keeps getting added to the story, while repeating the earlier elements.  That's an easy tale to create.  Whether everybody in the group has to take turns or it's left to members volunteering an answer, the "bones" of the story is easily able to be used to make a whole new story.

First decide the time when the story takes place.  Bailey chose Thanksgiving, but it could be Christmas, a birthday, summer, whatever is volunteered.  Then who is delivering the "goods"?  Who will be getting them?  Start with somebody giving an item to be delivered.  How will the item be delivered?  (Bobby had a bicycle but who knows how your delivery will happen?)  Have that delivery get interrupted by someone else, but they have to add an item.  Keep adding interruptions and items until someone finally gets everything delivered.  (Possibly collapsing while finally delivering it all?)

There's no limit to how this could happen.  It doesn't even have to be delivered by people.  Imagine, for example, a pony is hitched to a cart with the first item and maybe other people or animals keep adding to it until finally the cart is full and reaches its destination.

Don't worry if the story gets silly.  It's not likely to win an award although Bailey did win a Newbery medal in 1947 for the children's novel, Miss Hickory.  She also produced many anthologies and this one is from The Wonderful Tree.  

As a storyteller friend of mine, Loretta Vitek says, "There's always a story; it would be a shame not to tell it."  Whether your stories are true or created from imagination, I hope your Thanksgiving adds only pleasant stories to look back at this very different Thanksgiving and the rest of our holidays.

************************

This is part of a series of postings of stories under the category, "Keeping the Public in Public Domain."  The idea behind Public Domain was to preserve our cultural heritage after the authors and their immediate heirs were compensated.  I feel strongly current copyright law delays this intent on works of the 20th century.  My own library of folklore includes so many books within the Public Domain I decided to share stories from them.  I hope you enjoy discovering new stories.  

At the same time, my own involvement in storytelling regularly creates projects requiring research as part of my sharing stories with an audience.  Whenever that research needs to be shown here, the publishing of Public Domain stories will not occur that week.  This is a return to my regular posting of a research project here.  (Don't worry, this isn't dry research, my research is always geared towards future storytelling to an audience.)  Response has convinced me that "Keeping the Public in Public Domain" should continue along with my other postings as often as I can manage it.

Other Public Domain story resources I recommend-

• There are many online resources for Public Domain stories, maybe none for folklore is as ambitious as fellow storyteller, Yoel Perez's database, Yashpeh, the International Folktales Collection.  I have long recommended it and continue to do so.  He has loaded Stith Thompson's Motif Index into his server as a database so you can search the whole 6 volumes for whatever word or expression you like by pressing one key. http://folkmasa.org/motiv/motif.htm

• You may have noticed I'm no longer certain Dr. Perez has the largest database, although his offering the Motif Index certainly qualifies for those of us seeking specific types of stories.  There's another site, FairyTalez claiming to be the largest, with "over 2000 fairy tales, folktales, and fables" and they are "fully optimized for phones, tablets, and PCs", free and presented without ads.
  
  Between those two sites, there is much for story-lovers, but as they say in infomercials, "Wait, there's more!"

The email list for storytellers, Storytell, discussed Online Story Sources and came up with these additional suggestions:            

         - David K. Brown - http://people.ucalgary.ca/~dkbrown/stories.html

         - Karen Chace - http://karenchace.blogspot.com/search?q=public+domain

         - Richard Martin - http://www.tellatale.eu/tales_page.html

         - Spirit of Trees - http://spiritoftrees.org/featured-folktales

         - Story-Lovers - http://www.story-lovers.com/ is now only accessible through the Wayback Machine, described below, but the late Jackie Baldwin's wonderful site lives on there, fully searchable manually (the Google search doesn't work), at https://archive.org/ .  It's not easy, but go to Story-lovers.com snapshot for October 22 2016  and you can click on SOS: Searching Out Stories to scroll down through the many story topics and click on the story topic that interests you.

       - Tim Sheppard - http://www.timsheppard.co.uk/story/storylinks.html

       - World of Tales - http://www.worldoftales.com/ 
           - Zalka Csenge Virag - http://multicoloreddiary.blogspot.com doesn't give the actual stories, but her recommendations, working her way through each country on a continent, give excellent ideas for finding new books and stories to love and tell.

     
You're going to find many of the links on these sites have gone down, BUT go to the Internet Archive Wayback Machine to find some of these old links.  Tim's site, for example, is so huge probably updating it would be a full-time job.  In the case of Story-Lovers, it's great that Jackie Baldwin set it up to stay online as long as it did after she could no longer maintain it.  Possibly searches maintained it.  Unfortunately Storytell list member, Papa Joe is on both Tim Sheppard's site and Story-Lovers, but he no longer maintains his old Papa Joe's Traveling Storytelling Show website and his Library (something you want to see!) is now only on the Wayback Machine.  It took some patience working back through claims of snapshots but finally in December of 2006 it appears!

Somebody as of this writing whose stories can still be found by his website is the late Chuck Larkin - http://chucklarkin.com/stories.html.  I prefer to list these sites by their complete address so they can be found by the Wayback Machine, a.k.a. Archive.org, when that becomes the only way to find them.

You can see why I recommend these to you. Have fun discovering even more stories!

The Birthday Dragon!

This past week has been one of those millstone, er milestone, birthdays.  What better way to celebrate than with a dragon?!  I love dragons and dragon stories, so I want to share both a bit of non-fattening dragon birthday cake

and a story about dragons and birthdays.  It comes in "bare bones" format to let you personalize it from a storytelling colleague active in the state of Georgia, Janice Butts.  Here's a photo of Janice in a beloved purple hat.  There's a story also about the photo.  When I contacted Janice for permission to use her telling of the story, she said:

I am sure it is dated now, but the hat was a gift from a friend to 'her favorite storyteller', so it makes me feel very professional.  I assume you can get it from my website. If not, we may have a problem, because I lost the hard drive recently with all those pictures.
 Again, enjoy the story.  I look forward to finding this on your blog.

Let's face it, we store all our memories these days on devices that can easily lose everything in a crash.  I'm going to give her photo here and, after the story, I'll give you a way to recover photos you may have sent out into the world online. 

Now let's gobble up the story as Janice shared it long ago.

The Birthday Dragon

(Janice opened with this disclaimer:

You are most welcome to use it in any way you see fit.  I got the idea from a children’s book.  I no longer remember the original or know where to find it.)

When telling this Janice personalizes it, using the name of the person celebrating their birthday for "child."

Child lives in poor village at the bottom of a mountain.  The whole community is poor because they don't have enough water to grow good crops.  When it is time for her birthday, child's mother says she can ask anyone she wants to her birthday party.  Child wants the dragon who lives at the top of mountain, as child has never met him, but heard lots of scary stories.

Mother refuses, but child decides to go find said dragon and invite him to party.  Child climbs the mountain 3 times, first 2 times dragon's fiery breath does not allow child to get near.  Third time, child manages to invite dragon to party.  He is touched and agrees, invites child to ride down the mountain on his back.  As they take off, his tail knocks away rocks that have been holding back a stream and brings water down with them.  Dragon is welcomed because of the water, and all live happily.  Each year since then the community has celebrated child's birthday because child brought water to them.

Janice closes with. . . what else? the song, Happy Birthday. 

LoiS here again.  Yes, you can sing that song without fear of royalty problems.  Back on October 2, 2015 I was able to report here the following wonderful news: I'll try to avoid my rant about copyright here -- the end of my Keeping the Public in Public Domain segments clearly shows my sentiments -- but I'm ecstatic about this long overdue ruling!  Warner/Chappell earned $2 million a year on a song dating back to their piano arrangement in 1935.  Most or all of that money will never be repaid.  Thank heavens the public kept the song alive.  Public Domain was intended to keep our cultural heritage alive, which Sonny Bono and his 1998 Copyright Term Extension Act, saving Micky Mouse from entering the Public Domain, has gone a long way away from that intent. 

I will add to that, the same corporate interests that went into the 1998 Copyright Term Extension Act want to see the Trans Pacific Partnership approved.  TPP is even worse because it will remove control of copyright from the control of the signing countries and make it no longer governed by the affected countries.  For World Read Aloud Day this year I explored the issue including also Intellectual Property and Digital Rights.  Take a look at the link to that article, because it will give you other resources to look into the issues which can affect us all.

Similarly the crash of a computer can be devastating, losing beloved photos.  I recommend regular back-ups.  Personally I use Carbonite because it covers so much inexpensively and without my needing to remember to do something.  Many of us have pictures on the internet, possibly Facebook or Google Plus or . . .   Performers put them on websites and are sometimes in articles.  (I HATE photos taken of me, but it's a necessity in my work.)  Here's an easy way to recover those online photos.  Search your name on Google.  In Janice's case, I added "storyteller" to avoid any others with her name.  I didn't trust my memory to find her website again and that was what I was seeking at first.  It didn't on the 1st page give me her site, BUT it included images!  When I went to her site, the purple hat pic she wanted me to use wasn't there BUT it was right there on the Google Images.  Clicked on the photo, then Save Image As, and it went to my Downloads.  An easy way for you to prowl the many images of yourself online and also save many of those photos you lost when your hard drive was lost!

I was happy to return the favor Janice did with today's story and guess there will always be a BUT or a Butt somewhere online.  For fun and even to buy her enjoyable CD, "Livin' Above Her Raisin'; Stories of the Blue Ridge Mountains", be sure to go to her site linked in my first paragraph above.

There's another local storyteller who also loves dragons I've mentioned here before, Loretta Vitek, has in her email signature the perfect things to end today's article. 
There is always a story, be a shame not to share it!
Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons,
for thou would be crispy & good with sauce.
Arriverdella

Appreciate a Dragon Day

Today is Appreciate a Dragon Day.

Chloe (Midnight Storytellers), the Dragon Whisperer

Honest!  It is officially listed as that.

There have been other posts here about Dragons and that link currently gives you three (3!) stories from the Keeping the Public in Public Domain.  Today I want to give something more.

My British storytelling colleague, Chloe, of Midnight Storytellers, and I started talking on the international network of storytellers, Professional Storyteller, about her work as a Dragon Whisperer.  She has generously given me permission to repeat what was said.  Librarian that I still am, we both mention some dragon books worth reading.

What started this was I mentioned my friend, Loretta Vitek, (found here at Loretta Vitek) and her love of the saying "Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for thou art crispy and would be good with sauce!" and Chloe responded:
Hi Lois, The Brit version is "Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons - for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup" ;)
I have another window / bumper sticker which says 'Sometimes the dragon wins'.
I've fascinated by dragons since I was 8 years old. A family friend with a talent for drama read The Hobbit to his children and me on joint family holidays. Then he read us Farmer Giles of Ham. I still love both. I think it was worth wading through excessive film hours to see Smaug gloriously realised - and voiced!!
My idea of dragons is like C S Lewis' idea of Aslan - not a tame lion... At DCHQ [Dragon Conservation Headquarters] we tell apprentices "Only The Keenest Survive".
This summer I was the world's first (probably) ever Dragon Whisperer in Residence at my local stately home Sudeley Castle. It's now just a Victorian replica of castle-ness but the place has links with King Henry VIII (the one with all the wives...) and has a lovely garden surrounded by farm meadows. A little place of magic in the Cotswolds.
What brought you to dragons?
Kind regards, Chloë.

My reply was:

Hi Chloe,
Finally free of a very challenging play I was in.  Wanted to do justice to a reply.
Ketchup?  Thought that was strictly American.  At least expected a Brit to call it Catsup.  (Now the word looks like a funny derivation should be hunted up.)
Tolkien's Hobbit's dragon also got me started back when I was a teen and reading it one summer. 
My favorite dragons are the Asian ones -- powerful, but not intentionally like the European ones who are so often either greedy or worse.  (Not that such stories aren't fun to tell, too.)  Presume you also know the Scottish, Assipattle vs. the Sea Monster tale -- title varies.  Such fun to tell and, while not a dragon, so dragon-like.  In contrast I also like Kenneth Grahame's Reluctant Dragon for the relationship between the little boy and the dragon.  That reminds me of Ruth Sawyer's The Year of the Christmas Dragon, with another boy + dragon friendship.  It's too little known, but I love its explanation of why so many in the western hemisphere look Asian.  As for Asian dragons, there are too many to count and I love to count their toes to see if they are imperial dragons or not. 
Something that really sticks in my mind from generations ago is "Day of the Dragon", a short story in Alfred Hitchcock's Monster Museum.  A professor, who has had his reputation ruined because he writes for the tabloids, experiments on a male and female alligator, giving them fully functioning hearts, whereupon they evolve back into dragons and wind up taking over the world.  Definitely a case of "Sometimes the dragon wins."  Love that saying, too.  Thanks for telling me about it.
Do you know P.S. member, Jill Lamede?  She does the Tintagel Dragon and even has a book, Tales of the Tintagel Dragon.  You would probably enjoy her website, http://www.lamede.com/index.html, especially http://www.lamede.com/page10.html.  If you get in touch with her, by all means be sure to say hello from me!
Happy whispering, Chloe!
LoiS(ssssss!)
P.S. I've enjoyed our conversation on this.  Would you mind my quoting any of it, complete with full credit and links to your information and site, in a blog I do?  Storytelling + Research = LoiS could do with another look at dragons.  Here's the two I've done there so far: http://www.storytellingresearchlois.com/search/label/dragons

Donita K. Paul

As you can tell, Chloe said "Yes", although by now there are three stories at that link.  It was worth saving until Appreciate a Dragon Day which you may want to know was started by the author, Donita K. Paul, back in 2004 to promote the release of her award nominated book, DragonSpell, which became a 5-book series.  If you go to the AaD Day link above you will find it includes additional dragon resources for those of us who do indeed appreciate them. For anybody wanting to read more dragon stories there is a bibliography page of recommended books, as well as not one but two pages of program and flat out sizzling fun with her AaD Day page and then additional links given as Bright Ideas.


By the way, when I mentioned Professional Storyteller, I want to back up just a bit and mention you can find Chloe's page there gives even more information about her.  Professional Storyteller is an excellent resource for and about storytellers and storytelling.  For my storytelling friends it gives a free page of promotion, the opportunity to blog, post photos and videos, and even promote storytelling events.  The discussion groups there aren't overwhelmingly busy, but are yet another resource both for public viewing and conversation.  Members can post on each other's page or email there privately and the search box gives a wonderful means of locating other storytellers nearby and also when traveling.  Here's my own page there.  Can you tell I consider PS a resource worth promoting?

But as they say in television infomercials "Don't Stop There!"
I also want to mention another dragon-loving, and, of course, dragon-telling British storyteller, Jill Lamede, she is a resource mentioned here earlier when trying to find more about something happening at Land's End, another name for Cornwall and Tintagel where she lives and works. Back then I said: Then I remembered Jill Lamede, whose delightful Tales of the Tintagel Dragon is now available on Kindle.  I had bought from her a hard copy of the book years ago, ordering it for Mount Clemens Public Library so I could tell it.  It's still there and I finally remembered her saying another name for Tintagel was Land's End.  That's Cornwall!
As Jill recently reminded me, Tintagel is not very far from Lands End, both are in the magical county of Cornwall in the furthest southwest toe of England.

I especially enjoyed the summer she even worked with me to use her book at the library.  Jill (also on Professional Storyteller where she has so far posted 6 videos) has always been a great online friend to me starting way back with the international email list, Storytell, sponsored by the National Storytelling Network.  NSN is truly a member-driven organization for those of us who love storytelling, so I also urge you to go to the jam-packed website if you are a storyteller, want to find a storyteller, or just want to know more about storytelling.


You just never know what we storytellers might share with each other to resolve research questions.  I'm delighted to have the friendship of both these British storytellers and my local storytelling friend, Loretta Vitek.  If you scroll down to the bottom of North Oakland County Storyteller's directory of members you will find more about Loretta.  Just be sure to remember her warning, which I slightly misquoted.  It should say Do not meddle in the affairs of Dragons, for thou would be crispy & good with sauce or Chloe's British version "Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons - for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup"  Either way, be sure you do your appreciating dragons carefully.

Ideas & Thoughts Upon a New Year

This version of Tolkien's "The Road Goes Ever On" seems appropriate as 2014 comes to an end and 2015 approaches.
The Road goes ever on and on,
Down from the door where it began.
Now far ahead the Road has gone,
And I must follow, if I can,
Pursuing it with eager feet,
Until it joins some larger way
Where many paths and errands meet.
And whither then? I cannot say.

The Tolkien Gateway, a network and encyclopedia that says anyone can edit it, includes a page with an appropriate look at the walking song, "The Road Goes Ever On" fictionally written in three versions by Bilbo Baggins in the last chapter of The Hobbit as he's finally returning to the Shire; the version I posted here is when Bilbo in The Fellowship of the Ring sets out for Rivendell and later slightly changed by Frodo; and a final version at the end of the trilogy again by Bilbo.  J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit was turned into three movies by Peter Jackson -- as many as the three films he made of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy -- but finally in 2014 even that had to end.  I don't know if the Gateway's future will ever end, but Tolkien lovers have plenty of resources there.  It currently has 11,329 articles, 41,774 pages and 8,711 images.  They are careful about copyright, but don't seem worried about the Tolkien estate suing for copyright infringement, so I trust my giving the version I used here is acceptable and considered Fair Use.

On Facebook a great idea for the coming year is highly adaptable for storytelling or life on the Road That Goes Ever On.

"This January, why not start the year with an empty jar and fill it with notes about good things that happen. Then, on New Years Eve, empty it and see what awesome stuff happened that year. Good way to keep things in perspective! ~Krystal~ — with Dorinda White."


That message has been shared by many on Facebook.  It took a bit of prowling to find it apparently originated with Dorinda White and Krystal and was posted on The Pagan Circle page.

As a storyteller I see various storytelling ideas in it.  Put your story ideas there, too.  I'm not too inclined to write stories about my life, but that might change with a jar of "good things that happen" or I might toss in ideas for original stories as I am inclined that way.  Yes, your teachers who required journaling might have been suggesting something roughly the same, but journals and diaries seem to require constant regular input.  This is a bit more sporadic, spontaneous, and doesn't require more than writing just enough to later know what happened.  

Prefer techie methods?  Get an app for notes or use Evernote.  Here's an article to help you find anything in Evernote if it becomes like an overstuffed file drawer.  While you're at it, does your cell phone have a voice recorder for taking notes?  That or a mini-voice activated tape recorder could go with you hiking with your dog or hands free while driving.  

As local storytelling friend and current president of the Detroit Storytelling League, Loretta Vitek, puts on her business cards and email signature, "There is always a story, be a shame not to share it!" She grew up in an Italian storytelling family.  In contrast I sometimes say I became a storyteller because families like that were so different from my own upbringing and I felt "story deprived."  Maybe that's why she is comfortable with personal storytelling and I'm not.  Still I do enjoy story creation, so even if it's not personal happenings, the jar or Evernote deserve to become a new habit for 2015.

Of course I also love the other comment Loretta couples with the previous message: Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for thou would be crispy and good with sauce."

May 2015 bring you only the best stories!