Everybody Has A Story To Tell

How two community events inspired me to look at stories anew

What makes a story worth telling?

Does everybody have a story to tell?

Do I have a story worth telling?

These were among the myriad of questions swirling through my mind after I attended The Moth Mainstage event last December.

The Moth, for those who don't know, is an international¹ storytelling organization with chapters around the world that meet monthly to tell stories on stage without any notes. They've since created “grand slam” events for regional storytelling winners and curated “main stage” events like I attended.

I'd heard good things about The Moth prior to attending and knew they had a podcast full of recorded stories, but having never listened to it, I didn’t know what to expect.

Curiosity is how I found myself, accompanied by my friend Steph, amongst a few thousand audience members high up in the nosebleed section of the Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall for the show. (Although “nose bleed” is hardly an apt term for this historic hall adorned with ornate decor that was giving Renaissance.)

As the lights dimmed, signaling the show’s start, I settled back into my seat readying myself for an evening of storytelling.

There were five storytellers in total, ranging in age, upbringing, place of origin. Their stories varied in nature. One woman spoke about finding her long lost sister who disappeared more than 20 years prior. A young man spoke about the friendship he found in an unexpected pet dog and how it saved him from alcoholism. Another young woman detailed the story of her upbringing in a wealthy family, loaded with money but lacking in love, a premise straight out of Schitt’s Creek.

As the diverse storytellers faded in and off the stage, I went on a journey along with them. I laughed. I cried. I cringed. I sat on the edge of my seat, wondering how the story was going to end.

While the details of these storytellers’ lives have since faded from my memory, the feeling of that night did not. Our two plush theater seats may as well have been a car on a roller coaster, going up, up, up…the tension building, to what, we didn’t know. But something was going to happen! And then WHOOSH. Down with a force, the emotions washing over us like a strong gale. Had there been someone there to capture a photo of us like those rides at Disneyland, it could've been a different expression at any given moment. Sympathy, sadness, laughter, pain, happiness.

That’s just it then. What makes a story worth telling?

Something that makes you feel.

A few days later, I attended a Portland CreativeMornings talk. CreativeMornings is “a free monthly breakfast lecture series designed for creative communities” with chapters all around the world.²

This month’s talk centered on the theme of Cycle and featured guest speakers Laura Molton and Ben Hodgson of Street Books, a Portland street library.

Laura, the founder of Street Books, started this nonprofit in 2011 with the intention of bringing literature access to unhoused folks in the community who didn't have an address and therefore couldn’t get books from the library. She forged a friendship with “Hodge,” a former unhoused man whom she met in the early days of her project.

Together, they took turns reading excerpts from their co-authored book, Loaners: The Making of a Street Library. As the book’s synopsis so aptly describes it, “Loaners is the story they began to tell when they reconnected, offering a street-level perspective of a community whose stories are seldom told.”

I'll admit, I hadn’t really thought about these "stories seldom told.” I think it’s easy to forget that unhoused people have stories just like us and that having no home doesn't make them any less human.

My partner and I were so moved by the readings, which made us laugh, tear up, and feel so deeply, that we bought 3 copies. One for ourselves, and the other two for Pete’s stepdad and my dad for Christmas.³

After these events I found myself thinking, what are my stories? At the risk of sounding trite, I couldn't help but feel as if I didn't have any stories worth telling because I didn't experience any capital T Trauma.

How limiting a belief is that?

The Moth, maybe because it was a Mainstage event, featured what were in my mind “larger” stories, i.e. life-changing experiences that altered the course of their tellers’ lives. The Loaners reading at CreativeMornings, on the other hand, centered the smaller minutiae of an interaction, the daily happenings. And those stories are just as valuable and deserving of an audience.

By telling myself that I didn't have any stories worth telling, I couldn’t think of any; but once I expanded my mind to tell myself I do have stories buried inside, I started remembering things.

I do have stories to tell.

What I love about The Moth and CreativeMornings is that they center the stories of everyday people. Not celebrities or folks whose lives seem so distant from ours, but someone who is our neighbor. And I think storytelling is at the heart of community. Stories are how we relate to one another as human beings; they’re what form connections and social intimacy, community, empathy. You don't have to have lived a certain number of years or a specific life experience to tell a great story.

Growing up, whenever I told a story I was often teased about “getting to the point” due to my verbose explanations and sometimes irrelevant details. So I don’t think of myself as a natural storyteller by any means.

But both of these community experiences, combined with my recent foray into writing classes, has gotten me thinking a lot about my stories. What are they, and how can I go about telling them?

The written word is a form of storytelling, after all.

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1. It’s worth noting that while technically international, The Moth’s only locations outside of the US are in Australia & the UK.

2. Legitimately international, they have 248 chapters worldwide :)

3. Full disclosure, I have yet to read it but my dad finished his copy and really enjoyed it!