Wednesday, February 15, 2012

The origin of stories

I should be working on making my story, "The Imperfect Pilgrim" a lot better but I've been procrastinating. I dearly wish that procrastination was an attribute of God--that somewhere an obscure Tablet of Baha'u'llah ends with "God the Procrastinator". I know, not going to happen-get to work Ronnie. I promise myself I will work hard this day after I finish this blog.
I woke up thinking about the origin of my love of stories that has now been passed on to my daughter. My mother was not a writer, but she was a captivating story teller. She had a million stories-she conversed in stories. I confess that when she talked about her trip to the Soviet Union in the 1970's with a group of chiropractors I would groan and ask for mercy. "Mom! not that story again! She loved stories in the form of old black and white movies made when she was young. I came to understand that she was young again sitting in her easy chair glued to the TV remembering where she was in her own life. I watched the original "Dracula" movie with her and she recalled sitting in the theater when people left their seats and ran terror--stricken from the bloodthirsty Count.She stayed, drinking it all in(pun intended).She had a child's belief in the big screen-it was all real--she felt the emotions booed the villains--cheered the heroes while celebrating with a bowl of ice cream. One night, After watching the "Wizard of OZ" she was feeling bad about the passing of the troubled life and death of Judy Garland and wondered where she was buried. I didn't help her grief at all when I told her that a diner in Philadelphia had purchased her bankrupt body and was displaying her Lenin style in glass covered coffin in their foyer. She was horrified at the crass commercialism of this awful diner and said that she, for one, would never eat there. Of course, she was shocked at my bad taste humor which only made it more hysterically funny to me. So I sit here about ready to shift gears and get back to my own story writing. Thanks Mom, have another bowl of ice cream. As you told me when I was a child,"Ice cream is free in heaven".