We Are Storytellers All

By Paul Roberts

I get the pleasure of heading back to Kellogg High School again tomorrow. It will be my second time this fall subbing for one of the English teachers there. I am assuming we will be continuing with the reading of To Kill a Mockingbird in the sophomore class and Flowers for Algernon in the freshman class. Two great novels.

I was reminded the last time I subbed how much I enjoy sharing literature with my fellow human beings. And how strongly I believe that we are all story-tellers at heart. That doesn’t mean we are all good at it, or that we are good at it all the time, every time. But it does mean we all have stories to tell, and we have a built in desire to tell them.

Author John Steinbeck says that same thing through one of his characters in the novel Of Mice and Men, which just may be my all time favorite novel to teach. All of his characters experience what I think of as a universal, human sense of loneliness and isolation. It’s painful, but I love the scene when the stable-hand, Crooks, opens up to simple minded Lennie - the only person it is safe for him to open up to. Someday, I’d love to play this character.  

“...A guy needs somebody—to be near him… a guy goes nuts if he ain't got nobody…a guy sets alone out here at night, maybe readin' books or thinkin' or stuff like that. Sometimes he gets thinkin', an' he got nothing to tell him what's so an' what ain't so. Maybe if he sees somethin', he don't know whether it's right or not. He can't turn to some other guy and ast him if he sees it too. He can't tell. He got nothing to measure by. I seen things out here. I wasn't drunk. I don't know if I was asleep. If some guy was with me, he could tell me I was asleep, an' then it would be all right. But I jus' don't know…”

Once again I find myself writing (mostly to myself?) about the importance of community. The longer Carol and I work at this “creativity cultivator” thing the more I find myself actually believing the things I am writing about. And at this point in my experience, it’s the relationships, the community, that I find the most enticing. Rewarding. Desirable. Indispensable.

Consider this my long-winded way of saying once more to each of our readers, supporters, subscribers,  and listeners…keep sharing your stories with us. And thanks for being a part of the Grow Me a Story community. 

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Think back to middle school, junior high, high school. What novels had the most impact on you? Why?

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