Hugs in the Grocery Store…
TELLING AT THE SONORA CHRISTMAS CRAFTS FAIRE IN 1982
Being a Community Storyteller opens many doors and windows...right into people’s lives! On this storyteller’s road I have met many families in my county, some of whom I’ve known for 4 generations! In my career as a storyteller and educator, I’ve met untold numbers of kids in libraries and schools, but I don’t always meet their parents. Kids in classrooms, school assemblies, or on field trips (to the library) don’t always have Mom or Dad with them. So, as a result, I’ve had a few awkward moments in the grocery store. A child will run up and give me a big hug, while a parent looks on and wonders, “Is it time to re-teach ‘The Stranger Danger Lesson’?”
Fortunately, living in a small town allows me a bit of wiggle room. Parents catch on pretty quickly when I explain how I met their child. It’s actually one of those experiences that taps right into some soft spot in my heart. It also reminds me how grateful I am to be a part of this community in a place where ALMOST everybody knows your name!
But with every coin, there are two sides. This Small Town Celebrity status among locals, who are under the age of 10, means that I have responsibilities: To act with kindness. To remember my words. To greet them with love and respect, even when I’m tired and in a hurry. My own children have a long-standing joke about not letting MOM go to the grocery store. “She’ll run into 10 people, and she’ll stop to talk to each one!” They are correct: Little kids, lots of grown-ups who knew me when they were little, parents who remember me from Library Story Times, teachers that I met along the way…What a blessing it is to have had a career right here at home.
TELLING “THE CARROT SEED” AT SOULSBYVILLE ELEMENTARY IN 1981
Years ago I dreamt of being one the big National Platform Tellers, sharing tales at all the major festivals. AND for a while I was on that course until a family illness put the brakes on that plan. Fortunately the contacts I made in those early years have helped me bring lots of those Big Name Storytellers to our town. One day I took a visiting teller to lunch at a popular local eatery. While we enjoyed each other’s company, a lot of people stopped by our table to say, “Hello.” Not to the famous teller, but to little old me. I had the joy of introducing them to the teller and inviting them to our upcoming concert. At the end of lunch, she said, “You are so lucky.” What? But I missed out on that shooting star! Then she added, “In my work I am always on the move, from one town to another. I’ve never had the chance to stay in one place. You’ve done that. You’ve had a chance to become the community storyteller, and that has given you a role in the lives of these good people.”
In that moment, I felt a surge of peace and of purpose. It is my prayer that these feelings and revelations will continue…even as I am now in my 6th DECADE telling stories in Sonora and Tuolumne County, California.
