On Storytelling

We are a people driven by stories. We describe life with analogies and metaphors. We spend billions of dollars a year on stories told in books, on silver screens, through velvet voices and in high definition. We sit down at Christmas time and read from books the stories of years past. We lay in front of fireplaces reminding each other of times in life we’d like to revisit. We love the beauty of stories. And we’re killing them.

Between May 2 and May 4 alone, the top ten movies at the box office made approximately $152 million, Iron Man claiming a cool $102 million single-iron-handedly. Relaying these figures is in no way meant to downplay how well told these stories are, I’m only meaning to put into perspective how desperate we are for a story. However, we’ll all agree that there have been several movies claiming kingship of Hollywood mountain that were better off mucking the stables.

Television is the spoiled step-brother in this situation. It’s getting away with a fair amount more because it’s cuter, less complicated and we have to deal with it on a much more regular basis and have learned to choose our battles by now. And, having just mentioned choosing battles, I won’t even mention the book industry.

We are desperate for stories because we all long to be a part of something great. We see a two-minute trailer and are already planning our Friday night 6 months from now. We tune in week after week to be included in what’s going on in works of fiction.

The Kingdom of God itself is a story. It is the context of every story you’ve ever heard, read or written. It is the world outside our windows driving by, swaying in the wind, ringing our doorbells and delivering us pizza. We are the citizens of the Kingdom of God. The smallest breath from our lungs can cause waves of change to pour over the world.

It’s such an enormous irony that we will do whatever we can to be a part of someone else’s story when ours is so spectacular, so perfect, so in need of some good plot movement. Trust me, I’ve read the spoilers, and the climax/resolution will blow you away.

Filed under: Culture, Essay, Writing

Eroica

*Disclaimer: Despite suggestions from like-minded individuals on the title of this essay being misread as “Erotica,” I’ve decided use it anyway, knowing full well the ramifications that will likely ensue. Good day.

I have a borderline unhealthy addiction to a television show. It’s called Heroes, and it is the embodiment of a very applicable adjective: phenomenal. The show bases around a group of supernaturally empowered humans who are currently in the thick of their second mission to save New York and, thus, the world. At  first glance or a quick reading of its overview, one could assume that it is nothing more than a serial drama version of X-Men. Not true. There are no costumes or capes or handicapped professors. No one is referred to as a mutant and everyone is fully clothed and very much un-blue. What makes Heroes so phenomenal is its ability to make the audience believe that these people are out there somewhere, just like you and I, living ordinary lives, working ordinary jobs, and saving the world on top of it all. After the eight o’clock hour is over on Monday night I do two things: 1) Blink for the first time in 60 minutes, and 2) Feel completely disconnected from their reality and forced back into my very un-super life with the burning thought, “Why can’t this all be real.”

My entire life I’ve wanted to become a hero when I grow up. There was this lake behind the house I used to live in, and I would go swimming in it and pretend I found sunken treasure. Also, I did this thing where I would get under the sheets of my bed and lay completely still, so as not to let the T-Rex in my room know I was there, having learned from Jurassic Park that their vision is mostly based on movement . Then, I would throw back the covers and unload a countless number of imaginary bullets into Old Rexy, thus saving the tiny town he would have devoured had I not held completely still under those Mickey Mouse Club sheets. I remember I would spend hours in my driveway shooting hoops over imaginary Shaquille O’Neals and Minute Bolls until the summer afternoons faded into fall evenings when it became too cold and got dark too early for such acts of sheer athleticism. I would vocalize the overly excited commentator and repeat the same jump shots until I finally excecuted that perfect buzzer beater, then I would  raise my hands in the air, triumphant, thanking all the squirrels and birds and nosy neighbors for supporting my illustriously perfect career. I always sucked as basketball in real life.

I’ve been thinking a lot about heroism these days. I’ve been trying to imagine what it looks like. It dawned on me recently that of the greatest acts of heroism in history, the hero’s intent was never to be remembered or immortalized in any way. Every great hero in history has been labeled as such because of his selflessness.

The truly beautiful moment in Heroes occurs in the season finale. The character who has been set up to be the most arrogant, self-centered, most like-me person in the show turns out to be the true hero. He saves the world by facing what he knew was death, and he did so out of love.

When we start to view heroics as selfless acts of love we blur that line between the indestructible wonder girl and the typical high school cheerleader. We won’t be able to tell the difference between the teleporting sword smith who can manipulate time and space and just some computer geek who is overly excited by Manga.

It is only when we stop desiring to save the world and start taking action to see the world changed that we can truly be called honest-to-God heroes – living ordinary lives, working ordinary jobs, and saving the world on top of it all.

Filed under: Essay, Personal, Writing

A Cup of Coffee

I was reading at a coffee shop a few nights ago when I began talking to an old man by the name of Gene. He was one of those old men whose soul was no older than Peter Pan. The wrinkles high on his cheeks surrounded eyes that shone the clear blue of youth and his voice carried the vigor of a young man on the altar or on the phone with his friend shouting “It’s a boy!”

Our conversation began as any would. We each had our newspaper: he with his Kansas City Star and I with my artsy local weekly referred to me by a girl I know from school. I commented on the abysmal success of our Royals and how they need only to win one more game to stay under 100 losses for the first time in years. Gene agreed with a chuckle and added that he was at first very pleased with our new manager, but now realizes that our problem has always been that we need some good left-handed pitchers.

Gene and I talked like old friends until the place closed down. Topics on the table were anything from bad drivers to the arrogance of college athletes’ touchdown celebrations to the fallacies of the church to petty theft and the moral equivalence therein to any other crime.

As I watched him drive his tank of a silver Suburban down 7 Highway toward the interstate I realized that I love that old man. Old Man Gene the Photographer from Oak Grove. I watched his tail lights for as far as they would let me follow them, until they were tiny red dots blurring with the big trucks and sports cars that may or may not be those damn bad drivers from Johnson County.

I sat outside for a while after the lights inside had been turned off. Just me, my paper, The Age of Innocence and the quasi-Techno Latin band singing to the bugs flying madly around the light above me.

I often wonder, “What is Gene doing now?” I like to think of him driving that giant SUV down some distant highway, sipping his coffee and singing the love song on the radio to his wife, asleep in the passenger seat. He is probably on his way to his son’s house to bounce his granddaughter on his knee or to teach his grandson to skip stones.

I pray I will remember that man for years to come. I want to remember how he reminded me of the ease involved in loving a stranger and of how that person next to you at a stop light or behind you in the movie theater is just like you: in the middle of their story and trying to make the best of it. I want to always think of Old Man Gene the Photographer and how he made me cease to question why God created the coffee bean.

Filed under: Culture, Essay, Personal