The Art of Storytelling

Well, it’s been a while…

I just didn’t realize it had been this long, but it hasn’t been for a lack of ideas. For the past year, I’ve been collecting thoughts and stories on my Notes app on my phone, wondering if I would ever share any of them. As my full-time work at school has consumed most of my professional life, I’d still like to keep blogging as much as I can. I still have a lot on my mind, as usual.

At my school, we offer quarterly experiential education courses and I am co-leading one called, “The Art of Storytelling.” I’m a college counselor, my co-lead is a film teacher, and neither of us have ever taught English as far as I know, which I hope encourages students who aren’t the English types to learn how to tell their stories in their own ways. 

So with that in mind, I will have some more admissions-y things to say later, but I guess I’d like to break my posting fast by sharing a story I read during a school assembly last year. This story has nothing to do with my work, but I suppose it has some college admissions pertinence. It’s hard to feel at peace with yourself during a process that feels like being yourself is not good enough. If that sounds like you, I encourage you to read my story below.

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It was a lovely day for a walk, but it wasn’t like we had a choice.

We were somewhere in northern Spain in the middle of a pilgrimage. Like, an actual pilgrimage where people from all over the world visit to walk in the same direction, to reach the same destination, all for different reasons. We even called ourselves “pilgrims,” unironically. I was hoping this journey would serve as my season in the wilderness.

The Austrian woman was on her own pilgrimage. We had walked together the previous day, and our similar statures made us compatible walking partners. The Germans and Dutch were way too tall, the Koreans too competitive, and everyone else was partnered up. So off we went for a seemingly normal day on the road. 

During our walk, I suggested we take a shortcut, which I found on a Spanish app that ended up being the “trust me bro!” of guidebooks.

We strayed from the path as instructed, walked through a scary tunnel as instructed, and when we reached the other side, all we could see was a wall of bushes.

A normal person would have turned around at that point. The Austrian woman insisted we move forward. 

And so we tried hacking and bulldozing our way through, as thorns scratched my arms, legs, and face. My app still said we were on the right path, “just trust me bro!” But there was clearly no path. 

A normal person would have turned around at that point. The Austrian woman insisted we move forward. 

And then came an epiphany. “What if we walked on top of the bushes,” she asked.

My response was not very tactful and included some light to moderate profanity, and the next thing I knew, we were bickering like siblings. She finally had enough and started free soloing her way up to where I couldn’t see her anymore. I had no choice but to follow. It took a while, but once I was able to reach the top and gain my balance, I realized the bushes were so overgrown, it was like walking on leafy green clouds. 

I finally reached the main path where the Austrian woman was patiently waiting for me, presumably on her second cigarette. I gave her a big hug and whispered in her ear, “I hate you.”

As we continued our walk, I looked at her face and underneath the scratches, I saw the smuggest grin I have ever seen on another human being. I took a photo, and it still makes me smile every time I see it, because three years later, we got married. Our pilgrimage continues together.

I still think about all the things I will never be able to do, all the places I’ll never see, all the people I’ll never meet. There are an infinite number of other lives I could have lived, and I used to flip through them in my mind, like a scrapbook of things that never were. I don’t do this as often now, and I’ve stopped asking myself “what if” altogether, because ultimately, I’m at peace with my choices. 

This is not a story about how I found my life partner. Well, I guess it is…but every story is about something, and it’s also about something else. So with that in mind, I want to offer a word of encouragement to all of you, to create your own path, embrace your epiphanies, and redefine normality.