Stories

This lovely, eloquent, takes-you-there entry from Enchanting Juno today made me think about my own experience with Damien Rice's music. Beyond the wonderfulness that is 'O' all on its own, I love this cd because it has a story.

I will suffer many indignities and hardships if it means I can come out of it with a good story. Mind you, I am not one of those amazing storytellers who have the ability to pull you out of you chair and propel you to another place, another time, another personality and set of emotions using words and gestures and passion. My stories generally don't make it to the paper (or the screen) in a way that I find satisfying. But they're mine, and they're a part of me in the same way that everyone's stories make them whole.

The time I:
- ran across the Orange Walk in Glasgow (kind of a protest parade), only to be rebuffed and yelled at by the crowds who wouldn't let me through on the other side until they were satisfied that I understood why I was wrong.
- sat on the edge of a 400-foot cliff, watching the waves crash far, far below
- fell into a puddle of the worst smelling rotten onion glop that ever existed
- sang and pounded the bus seats in an international (and possibly drunken) choral of triumphant return to Edinburgh
- was rained on by hot, sticky relish
- really and truly wished I were dead, rather than lying in a puddle of... well, let's just say I was seasick and I was not alone
- was trapped in the world's smallest elevator, nose-to-nose with John
- had to wrestle a Saint Bernard to the ground in an effort to rescue two panicked pymgy goats

And so many more. Many interesting only to me, most with an element of embarassment. The chance of a good story is balm to a wounded pride.

And as for the Damien Rice cd? Well, that was the time I decided I wanted to listen to the cd that I'd left in the trunk, so I pulled over into what I thought was a thin layer of snow along the (apparently narrow and perilously close to a ditch) shoulder of the deserted back road near Vineland.

Thank goodness for roadside assistance. And cell phones.