Who Is Your Storyteller?

In an effort to grow as a writer and share a bit of our mind set, here is “Audience Participation” a post column full of writing exercises, where we all can have a bit of fun.

As for the size and scope, the future is a bright white light of possibilities. However, in our journey of a 1000 miles, we do have a first step entitled…

The Storyteller

I found “The story teller” by Ginny Wiehardt, who got the exercise from Julia Cameron’s “The Right to Write”. The links give you the base idea but I had to put my own spin on things. Instead of the exercise you can find above, please read on for your mission, if you choose to accept it.

In Ginny’s and Julia’s version, participants are asked to picture your storyteller and asks them to tell three stories. They say to picture yourself as a child and write the stories you would have loved to hear.

In our version, we are going to tackle the story teller in the first part. What sex is she? What is his world like? Where do you picture her? Where would you sit with them to hear these stories? All these questions and more can be answered about your storyteller. They are yours and can have any quark or attribute you like.

We have rules to follow and these rules are as follows. You have to like this person. Over the next couple installments, we shall spend some time with our story tellers and we should spend time with someone we like.

Now I don’t have to like your storyteller and you don’t have to like my storyteller. In fact, I bet my storyteller could beat up your storyteller. Anyway let’s try an example.

MY STORYTELLER

Where do you meet with your storyteller?

Some people might want to meet their storyteller by the rocking chair in the living room, others might want to meet their storyteller at the laundry mat.

My Storyteller and I meet at a local dive bar. He is the owner and we meet in the back room, which is a mini bar for VIP degenerates. Smoking is allowed and the God-fearing decent public is not. Cannabis and tobacco smoke mix in poorly vented splendor. To the chagrin of everyone in the mini bar, bad karaoke spills from the front bar. Behind us, degenerates of all class and creeds gamble feature comforts on green felt tables. The place is never hops but it’s never dead.

We have a setting, next up…

Who is your Storyteller?

Name: Oxford Shankmen
Age: 34
Height: 6’2″
Description/ History: Oxford grew up around his father’s bar. As a young man, Oxford traveled the world and lived the life of 5 men, before the letter of his father’s fate reached him. When his father passed away, he became the owner of his father’s bar and in part his legacy.

The road kept Oxford slim and his retirement has packed on the start of a gut. His green hair would be long but gel helps fight off gravity in all manors of directions. A tattoo of a white trash Betty adorns his shoulder. Her hair in a bee hive, a pregnant belly swells from a leopard print tube top, and she smokes and drinks as she puckers for a pose. When asked Oxford will explain his tattoo represents his taste for trashy woman but most people think his tattoo is a intellectual dick and fart joke about the nature of ink work. People often give Oxford more credit than he deserves.

Oxford enjoys alcohol over beer and cannabis over them all. We sit at the bar for hours and toke from the hookah, while we chat about life, the universe and everything else that may be answered by the number 42.

Most days you can find Oxford behind the bar with a tee shirt from his prize tee shirt collection, which runs the gambit of out right funny to outright offensive. He is a Strange Cat but, boy, he is interesting to listen to.

Now we have an example. Everything in italics is the way I chose to describe my storyteller. You can describe your storyteller anyway you want. I would like to hear about your storyteller. Post your description in the comments and we can all have a bit of fun.

Don’t worry my storyteller is a pacifist and won’t really beat up your storyteller.

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Join us next time for “Storyteller 2: Character Boogaloo”
Or go back to “ANF Challenge to You”
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