Places Replenish our Writer Souls. Reading stories aloud was a big deal when our grandchildren were growing up. Some of my favorite storyteller moments happened under the storytelling tree.
Our front yard featured a particularly family-friendly place. A yellow Adirondack chair fitted into a notch at a fence corner between two trees. I would sit in that chair with one grandchild at my side and another at my feet, and I would tell stories.
The way those two trees grew made me think of them as one. At ground level, they were far enough apart to accommodate a seat and small table. Further up, at about towhead height, they began to grow toward each other.
One day my grandson asked me about that. “What’s the story with the trees, Grandma.” He was staring at the place where the trees came almost together over my head, and he’d asked for a story. I gave him a story. Because that’s what grandmas and writers do.
“These trees were born close to each other under the ground, and they fell in love. When they grew above the ground and saw each other’s beauty, they fell in love even more. So much so that they couldn’t stand being apart and grew toward each other. Until they were side-by-side, with their branches entwined, reaching for the sky.”
The grandkids appreciated a good yarn and let me think they believed my tale. As for me, I believed every word with all my heart. Especially the feeling of it, which perfectly suited my yellow chair and that enchanting place. Because Places Replenish Our Writer Souls, and I definitely have one of those.
Stories have power. They lift and transport us out of real-life time and space into another universe, separate and apart. John Gardner called that universe “the dream of the story.” I believe in this lifting and transporting, but I also believe in places like the storytelling tree.
Places have power. Wherever we may be, we can picture ourselves somewhere else, like that notch in the fence at the corner of our front yard. We can take ourselves there, into the feel of it. The green branches overhead, the smell of grass and a child’s hair, the sound of birdsong on the soft air of late spring. The taste of contentment on the tongue. A feast for all of our senses as Places Replenish Our Writer Souls.
At bedtime in those days, I sat in another storytelling chair. Bright red, with a comfortable back cushion to ease me after delightful, exhausting hours surrounded by youthful energy. This chair stood between the dormers of the children’s bedroom, where the angles of the ceiling leaned toward one another, like the trees in the fence corner.
When I need a spirit boost, I take myself back to Christmas Eve in that red chair. There is a stack of books at my side. My deliberate singsong tone has droned two excited children almost to sleep. I reach the last book on the pile and begin. “Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house…” To this day, that line transports me to the red chair under the dormers. Places Replenish Our Writer Souls.
You must tell your re-spiriting stories as well. Stories of places that lift you out of the moment. Places that come alive for you in every detail, if only in your imagination. Your heart is opened there. You are moved to bring us there as well. Because Places Replenish Our Writer Souls, and we deserve to be replenished.
Alice Orr – https://www.aliceorrbooks.com.
Speaking of Christmas, A Vacancy at the Inn is Book 3 of Alice’s Riverton Road Romantic Suspense Series, and it is a holiday story. Find A Vacancy at the Inn HERE. Find all of Alice’s books HERE.
What Readers Say: “Alice Orr is the queen of ramped-up stakes and page-turning suspense.” “Warning. Don’t read before bed. You won’t want to sleep.” “The tension in this novel is through the roof.” “Budding romance sizzles in the background until it ignites with passion.” “I never want an Alice Orr book to end.”
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