narrative

Stories for passage to a brighter day

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We may be strangers that meet on a dusty road but together we share stories for passage to a brighter day.

Fragile yet strong. Battered by weather and by life’s storms. You stand resolute. Taken to the brink of despair. You share of the unexpected inquisition that threw your creative soul into a state of flux.

Yet I can’t see clearly. I hear your voice but I perceive through the heat haze of my own story. Wrinkles on the fabric of my life send off refracted and reflected light to your truth. With open ears I seek to listen, to understand, through the noise of beams and shadows.

For what I see is parchment. Parchment known for strength and stability. I seek to see your story written there. A masterpiece, a serenade, a lament. Your memoir; a collection of broken shards brought together inviolate for change.

BY DEE GRANT 2021

I find hearing peoples stories fascinating.  This reflective piece is the sharing of two narratives as strangers meet. Heartfelt stories where something unexpected changes their lifes journey. This is a true story based on meeting with a stranger earlier this week. Our backgrounds couldn’t be more different. 

I studied the Narrative Construction of Reality by Jerome Bruner many years ago and have appreciated the power of narrative ever since.

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Ep 2: #Job Hunt – The Blow-In

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…what employer would hire some ‘blow-in’ from interstate?

(with audio) Previously it was about That Elusive First Job. Now a new adventure! I had some idea that I was going to be some famous artist when I finished studies in fine arts years ago. I really ‘drank the Kool-aid’ on that one. So I moved north interstate to a great tourist town on Queensland’s Gold Coast. I started to look for work. I looked and I looked and I looked. Month after month I pounded that pavement, applied for those jobs, and wrote those targeted cover letters. Nothing!  Plenty of knock backs. I even offered to work for free and still ‘a flat no’… It was really soul destroying.

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Trip to the Theatre

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Photo by Aigars Jansons on Pexels.com

Since moving to the city I am amazed just how many things are truly at our doorstep. No need to drive ‘from here to Timbuktu’ to get to where I’m going. I no longer need to feel like I’m living ‘out the back of Woop Woop’ somewhere. Everything feels like it’s ‘a stone’s throw away’ and I’m so close by it’s amazing. We are getting ‘out and about’ so much more and not sitting ‘knee deep in traffic’. I was just so over that.

Tonight was a magical night. We booked tickets for the theatre to see a show called A Picture of Dorian Gray. It’s based on a book by writer Oscar Wilde from the late 1800’s. It’s ‘an oldie but a goodie’. I like things that ‘stand the test of time’. This version was a bit different though. The basic storyline is about a young guy who wanted to stay young forever. Anyway the adventure starts after he views a portrait done by an artist of him. I won’t go into the details in case you haven’t read this story. What I will say is that you need to ‘be careful what you wish for’. 

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#True story- Small acts of kindness

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‘You don’t look twice’ when you’re able bodied. Your there, rushing to get to work, ‘pounding the pavement’ to catch that bus, or grabbing that coffee. It’s like a mental repertoire of the familiar as we journey through our everyday. You go into autopilot. Then things go ‘pear shaped’.

Here is insight from a working age woman reflecting on human kindness after her world was ‘turned upside down’ a few years ago.

I get around on a 4 wheel walker these days. It’s a proper ‘pain in the neck’. Wasn’t part of my 5 year plan! But ‘it is what it is’ and has taught me a thing or two about the human spirit.

These 3 small things mean the world to me.

  1. The power of a smile It’s the smile of someone walking past. They understand. It is a quiet acknowledgement. A kindness that needs no words. How delightful!
  2. Time I need to plan things to the minutest detail. I love it when people appreciate that there is no such thing as hurrying up. I need to live my life considered now, not ‘hitting the ground running’ like when I was a rep.
  3. Small acts of kindness It’s the person that holds the umbrella over your head even though there not going your way. The lady that hails down a cab for you because they know you can’t.

My world may be small these days but these things really put a ‘smile on my dial’.

For Desiree

Term phrase meaning

  • You dont look twice – you don’t have to think about it
  • Pounding the pavement – running
  • Pear shaped – don’t turn out like you think
  • Turned upside down- things happen out of your control
  • It is what it is – a common phrase. The way things are.
  • Pain in the neck – very annoying
  • Hit the ground running – common term used in team building. Means to do your best
  • Smile on my dial – make me happy