CuppaGemma

“But mom you forgot the part where…”

And so it goes, somewhere in the upper end of the ten o’clock hour the little voices grade my precision and recall on fairy tale riffs. The detail that they waited and hoped for- mom forgot and skipped to the next paragraph. “Gig the ghost came out of the closet, he and Wormy were talking and THEN they went to see the prince!” Sighs of discontent.

Telling a story is something we all do regardless of whether the end result is little people finally asleep so bigger people can catch up on reading or phone calls or just chores in general.

Story telling serves a point and perhaps that is why there are archetypal characters and themes. The experience is the same no matter who tells it and what artifice we use to give it music and color.

There is an art to finding a way to weave the details through the hours and hold the listener rapt in the universe that you make that comes only of sentences but they can feel. Or as my youngest will say, “I was watching it in my head- do I have to go to sleep now?”