A Fabled Connection

Stories make us who we are.

From the time I was little, way back in the 1970's, my heart and mind were captured by stories, fables, and fairy tales. I was not a healthy child and my world was very small. There were not a lot of humans in my life and few good adults. But there was an endless supply of stories, legends, anecdotes.

Of course, I embraced all the European tales from Charles Perrault, Hans Christian Andersen, The Brothers Grimm. Everyone knows a version of Cinderella whether it is Disney-fied or gruesome. (You know, the one where the stepsister cuts off her foot to fit into the tiny shoe?) But I had the good fortune to be raised by a family of storytellers from different cultures.

My great-grandfather Chester had the blood of indigenous people running through him. He lived a long time and shared some of his magic with me. When I was nine, my right foot was covered in painful plantar's warts. I could not put a shoe on. He took me out to the back field, to where the garden ended. He said, "Okay Cinderella, let me see that foot." He rubbed a dry navy bean all over it, threw it over his shoulder and spit. "Don't go lookin' for that bean." A week later, my foot was clear.

My grandfather's family came from Ireland and Scotland, so of course I looked for actual fairies and helped make sure the garden crops were in before October 31st so the Pooka couldn't get them. We hid pennies to distract leprechauns.

My mom married my stepfather when I was 7. He brought Hungarian folktales and gave me a set of Collier's Junior Classics which I read and reread voraciously. Folktales and fairy tales from all over the globe. And he would have me read to him.

And as I read, images and colors and characters sprang to life in my rich, inner world. And he would always say, "You are such a great storyteller."

The thing is, in stories and in life, trauma happens. Conflict happens. My stepfather died in an accident on my tenth birthday. My mom disconnected. I was shifted between relatives and sometimes lived with people I did not know. And sometimes met the big, bad wolf face to face. And sometimes took on the role of the simpleton because others did not understand my autism. Villains and tricksters flooded in and I fought back with everything I had. Oh the cleverness of a damsel who can save herself from distress! Stories and legend served me both as armor and an instruction manual on dealing with people who would take advantage.

I began to write my own stories. Fiction but true enough, memory but universally known and felt. Human feeling connecting through word, through story, through song.

As an adult, I became a prevention educator. My job is to teach everyone Pre-kindergarten through adulthood how to protect themselves from villains and tricksters. I teach them how to listen to that gut feeling and make good choices. It's the lesson we learn in so many stories. It's building yourself a brick house, so if that wolf shows up you have a plan.

When COVID-19 hit, it changed everything and everyone. It disconnected me from the classroom. So many adults found themselves in empty houses, with empty pockets, with holes left in their lives where a loved one once was. We are grown-ups and we should be able to manage, but shouldering all the stripped down details of survival is daunting.

I taught virtually from home as often as I could. Sometimes I saw 20 beautiful, distracted faces of littles just happy to talk to someone. Sometimes all the screens were black and I felt like I was yelling into the void, hoping for an echo.

My rich, inner world, all the legends I knew by heart, kept me sane. I wrote, illustrated, and published "3 Sisters of the Sky" in March 2020. It is dedicated to my lovely friends, including my son's godmother who crossed into the infinite last January. It's about Soleil (the sun), Selene (the moon), and Celeste (the star). They share the sky and each has animal friends that help them. It is a lullaby book to help little ones not be afraid of the dark.

In December 2020, I wrote a little book called "I Would Bring You Sun". I sent out a card with the story to 100 people I knew. People who were hurting and feeling alone. The book is about empathy, about a group of fox friends who show friends that they care in different ways. The response nearly made my heart explode. It drove me to illustrate the story and publish the book. This story was needed. Just a simple piece of paper with a poem and a few painted foxes boosted people through the holidays. And I felt more connected than I had in a long time.

Story is vital to who we are. We tell them, trade them, make them into jokes, fashion them into song, whisper them to connect, devour them in books. They are universal, global, of every color and demographic, of every tribe and clan and tongue. My story for you is like a hug.

As "I Would Bring You Sun" ends, two fox friends are hugging.

"My hug for you is full of all those things. Your hug for me is too. It is a present we give each other."