Telling stories transformed Tacoma; what’s your story?

Years ago, when we were living in Southern California, our rental house was so close to the one next door that we could hear every word our neighbor screamed when she was scolding one of her sons.

I could never understand that her idea of a severe punishment was to lock him in his room and make him read.

For me, the worst penalty would be to leave me in a waiting room, on an airplane or in the passenger seat of a car and not let me do so. Even sleep doesn’t seem up to par without the storyline of a good dream.

Studs Terkel nailed it when he said, “People are hungry for stories. It’s part of our very being.” In fact, once the basic needs of life are filled, it is the thing we seek most. Maybe that is why the greatest preachers are also the best storytellers.

Perhaps our California neighbors would have done better to have taken their son on their laps and read to him when he was tiny.

Cave drawings and petroglyphs bear witness that humans have been telling stories in one form or another since they were first able to communicate.

For Hawaiians, “talking story” is a way of celebrating heritage. But not all tales are told in words. The strums of a slack key guitar, the swaying of the hula and the beat of its chants also convey a legendary past.

In all cultures, art, music, literature, theater and dance each bears its own chronicles. They are vital to the health of any community.

We need only walk down the streets of the theater, museum and university districts of this city to see how “story” has transformed Tacoma, recently recognized as one of the most artistic towns in America.

In tethering us to others by our emotions, stories help us to feel what they do, without having to walk in their shoes. Reading about life in a gulag, concentration camp or slave quarters may spare us those actual horrors, but sharing them vicariously cannot fail to stagger us with their impact.

Story can also help us find meaning and joy in life’s experiences, offer therapy from trauma or leave a legacy of wisdom.

Our appetite for genealogy is one way we seek story, but too often we wait too long to mine the treasure in our own families. How many of us regret the questions we never asked our grandparents, aunts or cousins as we were growing up — and then spend years later trying to recover these lost opportunities through research?

Likewise, how many of us have shared our own stories with others before it is too late to do so? Isak Dinesen says, “To be human is to have a story to tell.” We don’t have to be professionals to do it.

To realize how fundamental it is in each of our lives, consider that even businesses use storytelling to build their brands. Think of the competition that goes on each year among the commercials at the Super Bowl.

And in real life there are so many ways we are able to hear those of others and share our own. Whether it’s a chat while standing in line, time spent viewing the Tacoma Art Museum’s collection of Western American art or hours practicing as a cellist to perfect a Tchaikovsky passage for a symphony concert, we all need to keep “talking.”

Scientists tell us that we can even get someone to go along with a decision simply by telling them a story in which the best result is achieved by doing what we suggest.

Think of how many marriages that would save.