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Monthly Archives: June 2020

Silver Linings – Stories of finding the good in the bad

27 Saturday Jun 2020

Posted by Paul Currington - Fresh Ground Stories in Uncategorized

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July’s theme is “Silver Linings – Stories of finding the good in the bad.” It’ll be on July 16, at 7 pm PST.

I had another theme in mind for this show but I think we all need to hear some positive stories right now. I know I do.

Come tell a story about a time in your life when something bad turned out to be good. Did losing your job lead to a better one? Did getting dumped make you available to find someone better? Maybe someone died and you were finally free to become yourself. One day I’ll tell the story of how that last one happened to me. 

Here are the rules for telling at FGS : https://freshgroundstories.com/2013/01/22/storytelling-rules-and-guidelines/

Here are the main rules:

  1. Stories have to be true and happened to you
  2. You can’t use notes. We want you to tell the story, not recite it.
  3. Keep it clean in language and in content (no sex, poop, body functions, etc.)
  4. No social commentary. FGS is where we take the energy we usually use to judge others and instead use that energy to find out something about ourselves.
  5. Stories have to be under 8 minutes. Practice out loud on friends and time yourself.

I’ll send out a registration link to everyone in the Meetup group on the day before the show. We only have 100 spots (98 actually since me and my assistant each take one spot) so the first 98 people to register for the show will be the only ones who can attend. If you want to tell a story, email me ASAP so I can send you the registration link before I send it to everyone else. 

I tried to get a Zoom account that gave us more than 100 spots but it was much more expensive than I thought it would be. So we’re stuck with 100. Fortunately, we haven’t had more than that sign in to our online shows so we should be ok. Thanks for all the patience and understanding you’ve shown me since we took our shows online. The tech stuff is always hard to deal with even when everything is working fine. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve spent 30 seconds complimenting someone on their story only to find I had myself muted the whole time. So frustrating!

I’m really looking forward to this show. We already have a special guest teller lined up as well as a number of people I had to bump from the last show. Thank you all for supporting everyone connected with FGS. We need each other more than ever now and I’m grateful for the hour or two you grace us with every month.

See you on the 16th

Love,
Paul
freshgroundstories@gmail.com

 

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23 Tuesday Jun 2020

Posted by Paul Currington - Fresh Ground Stories in Uncategorized

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Thank you all for coming out and supporting our first online open mic show last week. We heard some great stories and got to welcome a bunch of first-time tellers to the stage. As always, we learned some important things that night.

We learned that only the power of love can get you to doorbell ditch a foreign embassy and end up running from an armed government anti-terrorist team through the streets of Prague. We also learned that if you don’t have enough blood going to your hippocampus it can look like you have a learning disability. I wish my fourth-grade teacher in Lathrop Elementary in Fairbanks, AK had tested me for blood flow to my hippocampus. I might have been let out for recess a little more often.

We also learned about the influence our parents have on us. As a parent myself, I’m always finding that it’s the things I don’t remember doing that my son remembers best. No matter where you grew up in the world, there are things our parents say and do that we don’t know the full relevance of until we’re long into adulthood. Two of our first-timers told stories that began in childhood but only took on special meaning more recently. While I listened to their stories I found myself wishing my parents were still alive so I could talk to them about that.

We also learned what happens when you lose a parent. Katie’s story of her dad’s unexpected death stopped us all. It was her first story and I was touched that she chose to share it with us. Even with the shaky internet connection I had, I could see how hard it was for her to tell that story. After she was done, her boyfriend leaned in from across the couch and give her a hug. I was glad she had someone there with her. He also gave her a Scone of Courage which was just about the sweetest thing ever. If you’ve been to our live shows you know that I buy a scone before the show (our show is held at the Olive Way Starbucks) and give it to the first first-timer to tell a story that night. I couldn’t give one away that night so I’m glad Katie got her own.

Ed, one of our tellers who tuned in from California, told a heart-warming story of being a drug mule in Africa in his 20s. If I remember, correctly, he never completed his first and only mission because he almost drowned in a river before he got anywhere. I kept laughing during Ed’s story because he looks like my State Farm agent. Now I’m wondering if my insurance agent has a secret life I need to worry about. Ed is a member of the California Association of Storytelling and likes to stop by and tell stories with us when he’s in Seattle. If you’d like to watch their online shows you can check them out here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/152681024925954/

Thanks for joining us from 1,000 miles away Ed 🙂

Indu told a beautiful story about how the closet was always her safe place when she was growing up. Recently, she made the choice to invite someone into her safe space. Instead of trying to get her to come out, he agreed to join her inside. Sometimes the kindest thing we can do is meet someone where they’re at, in the place they feel safe. It might be inconvenient to do that sometimes but love and friendship aren’t built on convenience.

The story that surprised me the most was from first-timer, Silvana, who joined us from Bellingham. She and her husband are foster parents who have turned their home into a safe place for many kids over the years. I know I wasn’t the only one who got choked up during her story. I think everyone listening that night wishes they could have spent a few nights at Silvana’s house when they were growing up. I know I do.

Thanks again for all the support and patience you showed me and the tellers last Thursday. There were a few tech problems on my end that I’ll be trying to fix before the next show. The first thing I’m doing is getting a higher level account that will give us 300 spots instead of the 100 we have now. I’ll also probably ask people to register for each show so no one has to email me personally to get the password and link. You won’t have to open a Zoom account to attend a show, you’ll just have to register for individual shows so Zoom can send you the sign-in info instead of me.

I announced next month’s theme at the end of Thursday’s show but I learned later that everything I said was garbled so no one heard it. In the end, it turned out to be a good thing because this morning I decided I needed to hear stories about something else. So next month’s theme is “Silver Linings – Stories of finding good in the bad.”

It’s a theme we did three years ago and I think we could all use a few stories about silver linings right now. I’ll get the official invite out as soon as possible. The show will be on July 16 at 7pm PST.

I had to bump a lot of tellers last week because so many people signed up to tell stories. I’ll be getting some of those tellers in on future shows where they can tell the stories they prepared for last week. So if you hear some stories that don’t match the theme, that’s why.

Hope to see you all next month 🙂

Paul
freshgroundstories@gmail.com

See you next week!

11 Thursday Jun 2020

Posted by Paul Currington - Fresh Ground Stories in Uncategorized

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Hi Everyone,

I hope you’re looking forward to our first online open mic next Thursday, June 18. The theme is Drowning – Stories of being overwhelmed. I originally scheduled this show for March and had no idea how relevant it would be when we finally got around to doing it in June.

Email me at freshgroundstories@gmail.com if you want to reserve your spot for the show. Let me know in your email if you want to tell a story. I’ll be pulling names out of Mr. Coffee like we do at our regular shows.

If you’d like some feedback on a story you’re working on, the Stay Awesome storytelling workshop next Monday is a great place to get it:
https://www.meetup.com/Stay-Awesome-Storytelling-Virtual-Workshop/

I’m also happy to help anyone with a story they’re working on. Email me and we can set up a phone call.

Rules for telling at FGS
https://freshgroundstories.com/2013/01/22/storytelling-rules-and-guidelines/

Here is my new favorite Moth story if you need some inspiration 🙂
https://youtu.be/C3ooZ0y9Z1I

NPR’s KNKX 88.5 has been really good to us over the past two weeks. They asked Maryanne to tell the story she told at our show last month.
https://www.knkx.org/post/episode-17-not-my-first-pandemic

Last Saturday they aired the live show we co-produced with them in June 2019
https://www.knkx.org/post/small-miracles-sound-effect-episode-182-0

If you can’t wait until the 18th and would like to tell a story tomorrow, you can join our friends at North Seattle Storytelling
https://www.meetup.com/North-Seattle-Storytelling-Meetup/events/271154015/

That’s all for now. Write me if you have any questions. 

Paul
freshgroundstories@gmail.com

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