Stories

"Stories are data with a soul" Brene Brown

I have been working on cleaning up my external hard drive for over a month now. It was bad. I had some pictures saved 3 or 4 times and there was no organization to it. I discovered a little over a year ago I am definitely a saver by date, it works for me. I still have other little categories I tag with, but for me date is the easiest way for me to find a picture. In doing this I have had to go through several years of pictures that were not saved by date and get them saved that way. I also have been going through and deleting bad pictures, pictures that I have a million of. Do I really need 500 of my brother running? I mean you see him run in 1 picture you've see all 500. Now of him getting his medals and all, that's different, but actually in running form, no, I don't need that many.

While going through this process I have come across so many different stories I can't wait to tell. Some that I forgot all about, some I've had in my head for a while and some that because of changes in life now need to be told.

This picture for instance, not the best quality picture. In this picture is my son, his best friend(his brother from another mother as Audrey says) and his best friends dad(or as my son calls him his other dad). However, at this time we did not even know them. How crazy is it that in 2 years time they became "brothers" and that it is only these 3 people in this picture. I have not cropped this picture or done anything to it. So now I am watching for other pictures of just the 3 of them so I can tell the story of how the friendship evolved.

How many times have we wished that we had recorded our grandparents or great grandparents or even our parents stories? What about our own stories from childhood? I used to think I didn't have much of a story to tell, not like I've gone out and conquered Everest or discovered something great, so what kind of story could I have that needs to be told. Then I got to thinking about things I wished I asked my grandma or things I wish I knew about my dad. And then I came across this quote by Brene Brown "Our stories matter because we matter." That is so true. Our kids stories matter. Someday they may want to know why they do a certain thing or why something matters so much to them. I wish my mom or my dad had done more to record stories about my dad so I could share them with my son. The 2 of them are so alike it is scary and my son never met my dad. I think it would mean so much to my son. I have given him a few things that were my dads and because of me telling him "that reminds me of your Grandpa Blair" they mean something to him, but I wish I could give him more of the story behind them. My son is obsessed with stats of sports I mean seriously obsessed. He can rattle off stats I had no clue he knew about, things that even I just don't get into. That was my dad so much.

We need to tell our stories. For ourselves and for our children. Whether it be in a "scrapbook" with pictures and pretties or just in a blog or journal our stories need to be told. Our children's stories need to be told. I so wish I had written down all the little things my son added to "Good Night Moon" when we would read it. It was a nightly thing for about 4 years. He could not go to sleep without Good Night Moon. As we would read it he had little things he added to it and he would always say those things when we would read the pages. I wish I had recorded that. It was to the point that I had the book memorized and even when it was left at home one time when we went to visit my mom instead of "reading" the book to him I simply "read" it from memory.

What stories are most important to you that haven't been told? What stories of other loved ones do you wish you knew more about? Do something to tell your stories. Start a blog just for stories, even a word document just to tell those stories. We all know the big ones, but what about those little ones, the ones you forgot, until something triggers the memory? Those are the stories that give us soul, those are the stories that matter.