We Need Stories Now

When I look at what is going on in our country, I'm overwhelmed.  I feel devastation, frustration, disheartenment, embarrassment, sadness, and disbelief.  I feel anxiety constrict my chest as my news apps load.  When I turn on NPR, I silently hope it's a replay of Ask Me Another and not the hourly news update.

We need stories now.

This summer I've been trying to read stories with voices that vary from my own.  I've made the choice to seek out writers who are not middle-aged, white, middle-class women.  Because I don't know the unique experiences of others as I know mine.  I've also sought out stories by women who match my demographics but whose lifestyles are beyond my scope of experience.

We need stories now.

As I look at what happened in Charlottesville, my heart cries out.  My heart cries out, and concurrently, I thirst for understanding.  It's easy to feel sorrow; it's more challenging to empathize.  I will never know what it's like to be a woman of color standing in front of a Confederate monument on her statehouse grounds.

We need stories now.

Sometimes we imagine that people reading at home are closed off from the world.  On the contrary, by experiencing the stories of others, we engage the world.  We learn more about the complexity of the human person.  We are in conversation with those whose lives are so different from our own, or perhaps so similar.

We need stories now.

As an English teacher, I too often hear students ask why they have to read novels for school when their future plans are in math or the sciences.  The answer is, because stories teach us about what it means to be human, about the variety of human experience.

We need stories now.

I urge you today to read someone's story.  Someone who may be different from you.
I urge you today to share your story.  Share it with someone who needs the understanding of you.
I urge you today to consider the complexity of the human story, the story of our country, the story of your community.

We need stories now.

Summer's End

I had such plans

The books I would read

The manuscript I would complete

The new characters I would unleash into the world

The workouts I would accomplish each and every day

The friends with whom I would catch up after such a long, busy spring

The places I would travel, places I may have never known existed prior

The foods I would learn to make in my own kitchen

The carefree games I would play with my children

The correspondence I would compose

The songs I would sing

I had such plans


Summer break always seems so vast when it begins, and it's sort of difficult that summer goes on even as we all head back to work and school.  Yet though I leave many of my goals unfulfilled, I cannot deny that it has been an amazing break.  I feel renewed, refreshed, and even more determined to pursue my career in writing.

And though break is coming to a close, it does mean that fall is on the horizon.  My favorite season full of my favorite tastes, sights, smells, and feelings.  So bring it, Mother Nature.  I'm ready for that crispness in the air!