The Story Of The Pork Loin: Some Stories Are More Important To The Grown Ups

Every year, a group of friends and I get together to celebrate my friends' adorable daughter, who is now 6 years old. Our traditional birthday dinner for this little girl is pork loin. Yes, you read that correctly. Why? I'll explain. I know you're dying to find out.

One night in January, 6 years ago, we were gathered at another couple's house in Mt. Airy for a semi-regular dinner, and my friend served pork loin. We ate, told our respective teaching horror stories, and played with my friend's son who was only about a year old at that point. The soon to be mother of this now 6-year old was spending a lot of time in the restroom, but of course we weren't going to call attention to it. Finally, she came down the stairs and declared she had to go to the hospital. We were worried, since her baby was due in March.

I lived (and still live) quite close to their hospital, so they hastily said they would drop me off. This story has been fine-tuned over the years. Like my grandma always says, the mark of a good story is one that is never told the exact same way. So the original story is that they dropped me off nearby my house, stopping the car quickly so I could hop out. They had no time for extended goodbyes. When told for dramatic effect, my exit from the car looks something like this.

Anyways, I safely got home, went to bed, and woke up in the morning, expecting to hear an update about how my friend was fine, and maybe sick from eating so much pork. Instead, my friend's husband texted me, "Do you have a camera? I need you to bring it to the hospital. We had the baby." I was about to say this was the age before camera cell phones, but in reality this friend will never get a cell phone with a proper camera. That's another story for another time. I made my way over to the hospital, where my friend was mummified up in hospital white, and gave him the camera. This little girl had come two months early.

Well, they all lived happily ever after. It was rough at first, but the baby show came early is now a charming, funny and smart little six year old with an adorable younger brother who did in fact wait until his due date. Still, every year we celebrate with a pork loin. My friends' joke that the pork loin started the premature labor.

This year, I tried to tell the momentous story to this little girl as she struggled to get out of her daddy's lap, anxious to stop talking to the grown ups and play with her little brother. The grown ups at the table laughed, sighed and got a little misty-eyed at the story. It was a huge moment for our group of friends. My friends' child on the other hand, waited impatiently until I was done, and then wriggled out of the lap and started bouncing on the sofa on top of her brother. She's clearly not too invested in her story just yet. As far as she's concerned, none of his ever happened.

We joke that as she gets older, she'll ask, in an exasperated tone, "Why do we always have to have pork on my birthday?"

Who chooses which stories are the most important?

As I begin writing, I'm keenly aware that I am not as up to date with news stories as I desire. I'm tempted to write all sorts of disclaimers, but I'm just going to take a deep breath, plunge ahead and attempt to write about something that really affected me today.

I've been following the coverage of the killing of the 12 journalists in France on January 7th. What happened was just terrible. I was so moved by the Unity March in Paris last weekend, and I love how the slogan "Je suis Charlie" has spread so quickly. Even a few celebrities at the Golden Globes mentioned the attack and wore pins with the slogan. It's amazing how the world seems to be rallying around France in support, including world leaders.

I was alerted to another horrific news story today. Over 2000 people were killed in Nigeria in an attack that started on January 3rd. Additionally, over 30,000 people were displaced from their homes.

My boyfriend L, who I completely trust as someone who is truly well-informed when it comes to the news, informed me that Nigeria's massacre received minimal news coverage. In contrast, the massacre in France has been covered consistently.

The stories that news outlets choose to share tell a story of their own. The story that ends up coming across seems to be crystal clear: Some lives are more "news-worthy" than others.

Like I said in the beginning, I am trying to become more well-informed myself. However, news outlets have the responsibility to inform the world of what's going on everywhere, not just what's going on in countries that someone may deem more important.

Every story matters.

The Storyologist

Welcome to The Storyologist. It's lovely to have you here.

I'm excited to continue my original blog in a slightly different form. I loved my journey with the theme of No Other Day The Same. This forum allowed me to look at every day through the lens of trying to discover what would make it stand out from the rest. I truly enjoyed chronicling my journey. The only snag was that after a while, I got to the point where I would almost stage those moments and they weren't truly genuine. The writing felt stale, and it had to change. 

Ergo, I'm ushering in a new concept in hopes that my writing will feel more aligned. You see, the part I loved the most about No Other Day The Same was getting to share my little stories with you everyday. I've been thinking a lot about stories lately.

Stories have always been transformative for me, granting me the gift of experiencing different viewpoints, ways of life, characters, places and more. I love reading, watching and listening to those stories that take me to other worlds. As Meg Ryan's character in You've Got Mail says, "When you read a book as a child, it becomes a part of your identity in a way that no other reading in your whole life does." I know Miss Rumphius by Barbara Cooney has formed my identity. Those childhood stories and stories I've read since continue to shape me as a person.

There's another type of story, and that's the stories we hear about people that prevent us from really understanding the truth; the stereotypes, the propaganda, and the biases. I love Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's The Danger of a Single Story because she cautions us against assuming one story can really get to the heart of the matter. Especially in this day and age when it's so easy to accept one story very easily as fact, I believe it's important to seek the deeper story.

There are the stories of who we are, and how we got to where we are today. I love listening to other people's stories. Ever since I can remember I've been listening to stories - stories of incredible courage, joy and greatness. One of my favorite stories is how my grandma snuck her horse named Ol' Doll up a flight of stairs and almost scared my great-grandfather half to death. I love putting the pieces together from stories and thinking about how each story truly is a tiny slice of a whole person. 

Then there are the stories that we tell ourselves that prevent us from taking risks or chances. There's the story that we are running out of time. There's the story that we can't get that job. There's the story that we can't ask for what we want. Those stories are not easily untold. There are some stories that we don't tell at all. The story of the secret desire that we wish for but don't utter aloud for fear of seeming silly or unrealistic. The story of something embarrassing or painful that we want to forget about entirely. Those stories are equally important and sacred. 

So, what's a storyologist exactly? You can't find the term in a dictionary. However, "-ologist" means "a branch of learning" or "a branch of knowledge" or "an expert". I'm skeptical of those who claim to be experts on any subject, however, I'm going to proclaim myself a storyologist simply because I'm a scholar of stories.

I can't wait to see where my new ventures take me as The Storyologist. 

Being a duck

Happy New Year, readers! I hope you are doing well, and that you had a wonderful holiday. Mine was full of cute babies, good food, long walks, family, friends and lots of movie watching and cat cuddling. It's been a good vacation. Here's my parents' cat, Ella, claiming her gift territory.

Today I woke up and had the urge to write. I didn't feel like I should write; I actually wanted to write. I've had this urge several times over the past year, yet most of the time I've stopped myself with thoughts like "I haven't written in so long - I can't start now" and "Do I have to go back and write all the blog entries I said I would write before I write this one? Slacker!" and "Meh - maybe I'll just watch Gilmore Girls instead". Don't judge on that last one. You've all been there.

Yet today I embraced the idea that I wanted to write without judgment. It's something I've decided to leave behind in my new year. Judgement is SO 2014. How liberating!

I've always had varied interests. I've tried blogging, marathon running, painting, salsa dancing, novel writing, Buddhist meditation, yoga and more. I'm still working on embracing my dabbling, since I've always wanted to have one or two areas of expertise. I've always wanted to be able to say - I'm an expert at ____. One website that I love, The Dabblist, is all about a woman striving to remove society's taboo around dabbling. She publishes tons of great resources to experiment with making things with your hands, which is so much fun. Some might consider dabbling flighty or lacking commitment. I prefer to think of it as continually having new mini adventures.

When I looked up images of dabbling, I came up with photos like this:

This surprised me at first. I re-checked my search to figure out why I had gotten images of ducks. Then I looked up the definition of dabbling from Merriam-Webster and came up with two: "to work or involve oneself superficially or intermittently especially in a secondary activity" and "interest to paddle, splash, or play in or as if in water". Upon further research, the image above actually linked to an article called Don't Be a Duck. Stop Dabbling. I read it, and promptly resolved to do the opposite.

I've been trying out new things/dabbling and judging myself, and I'm ready to break my pattern. Here's what happens: I'll find something I really like to do, I'll have a couple of moments where I truly enjoy it, and then I'll put so many rules and regulations on myself that it feels like another obligation and I stop it entirely. For example, I took this amazing Zumba class a couple of months ago. I danced like no one was watching and loved it. Yet shortly thereafter I implemented a schedule for myself, put all the dates in my calendar, and fell off the wagon the next week. Where's the fun in dabbling and trying new things when there's so much pressure to become an expert at every new activity?

So, on this rainy day in Philly, I've decided to think about the New Year a bit differently this time. Remember last year, when I proudly proclaimed all of my blogging New Year's Resolutions? Even just reading that list sends me into a panic now. It was too much, which is why I stopped blogging altogether and felt guilty about it for the rest of the year. I then created my writing website, and immediately started feeling bad for having no clients. I thought it had to be all or nothing, and couldn't see any in-between.

This year, instead of resolutions, I'm all about core desired feelings. Danielle LaPorte has created a really amazing way to think about goals that might seem at first like you're doing it backwards, The Desire Map. She says that in actuality, we are all chasing feelings rather than goals and to-do lists. For me, I've found that to be true. So here's what I desire to feel in 2015:

I desire to live my life in a way to feel these feelings, rather than making a gym schedule for myself. Looking back on the two definitions of dabbling, I'm really loving this one; "interest to paddle, splash, or play in or as if in water". That's what 2015 will be all about for me: paddling, splashing and playing, doing and saying what makes me feel true to myself (starting with this blog post) immersing myself in beauty, having adventures, connecting with people I love, and continually finding my courage. It's not all or nothing. I'm going to live in the in-between. Who knows what this year will bring? I'm excited to find out. What are you excited for in 2015?

There's nothing wrong with being a duck.