In the above linked article, someone kind of puts voice to two important things. That Josh Ritter is a powerful musician that tells stories, but could possibly be an even better storyteller in which the stories bring out music.
And then, storytelling is God. Story is God. I kiiiind of feel like they're close. I mean, Jesus is Logos. The Spoken Word of God. And He told stories. And stories, I've always found...and agree with this: "The great tapestry of our consciousness, closely examined, comprises little threads of story woven day after day into shape and design and meaning."
Today as I was driving the train and Hills Like White Elephants kept coming back to me. The extreme solitude of it. The crevacing feeling of two human beings being entirely pulled in two separate silent directions while the beauty of those white elephants bring an ever present beauty...or disgust, depending on which character you are at the time. Every time I pulled away from the station. It's really kind of silly. But I can't not feel it when I realize I'm on a train, leaving a station. It's weird. Whatever.
And then, today on the way to my grandparents, I narrated the story of a particular week of last March, when so very much changed with my friends, my family, and so on. Everything changed. I literally wrote out the whole story in my head in the thirty minute drive and went to moleskin when I drove up and bullet pointed each really vivid part. The truth of it, building slowly and all happening so perfectly in one week. I remember how the floor was cold on my bare feet as I told my dad how much I hated Atlanta, how the comforter smelled as I asked questions I had always been afraid to ask, how the sun was on fire as it set behind the Brick Pond and Cynthia and I unpacked hurtful truths. And the sincerity...the soul- of my mother's eyes as she told me on the bench beside the clock in the middle of downtown that she made a mistake long long ago.
It was all truth. It's weird. And even now, to see how silly I was as I come to realize my own selfishness in the things I wanted. I think freedom comes with truth, and self-realization kind of comes in the aftershock...because our God is graceful.
But I'm digressing.
Story. It's a curse. Above said article is spot on when it talks about the Muse and how it's more of a Monster deep inside, eating and taking and devouring. It literally, takes it all in. It doesn't give back much, but when it does, you know it. It's a curse. It's a blessing. Sometimes I wish my brain would stop narrating. I wish my brain would stop piecing puzzling together every single freaking subtle nuance. But until then, there's grace, and that silly Monster, well, he's good for making stories every now and then.
Storytelling is everywhere. I feel it the most in music. And then books. And people's lives. And then i love narrating it in my own life. This is the curse. Or is it just a blessing?
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