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My brother, Reid, with his grand-daughter, Anya. 2008
The burden of tale-telling is to think that by avoiding our responsibility to be part of living history we will stay forever young. By not telling those who follow us the stories of what it took to get here, we fail the harvest of our own life and the plowing days of theirs.
The blessing that comes with tale-telling is the awareness that we have now done our duty to life. We have distilled our experiences to the point that they can become useful to someone younger.
Joan Chittister The Gift of Years, Growing Older Gracefully
thank you, rich quote inside of your rich life.
Telling my tales is important for me. Unfortunately, for now my children do not choose to read them because, they say, I portray people they knew in a way they did not perceive those people. Nevertheless, today I sent off to a memoirs contest the story of my growing up in the segregated South. It’s my story, and I’m sticking to it. And I hope I live long enough to write a second memoir!
Our stories are our truth and I applaud your courage in speaking yours.
I agree with Sharon. You are telling your stories, not your childrens. Someday they may be sorry they did not listen.
That’s a wonderful way to describe the importance of story telling 🙂
Joan Chittister is such a wonderful source of inspiration. My mother was forever trying to tell us stories of people we did not know and we really did not want to listen to her. Now that she is gone, I realize that she was trying to tell us the story of her life and I do wish I had been more curious. Sadly, she wrote very little so the stories left as her voice faded away over the years.