Lessons in civic pride: Story Shuffle 6 audio is now live

Story Shuffle 6, with a theme of  Rebirth, I remembered a lesson I learned from an old neighbor: If I don’t clean it up, someone might notice.

Find all the stories here. Listen to mine here or below.

Listen here.

Love is so much more about the technique than the ingredients and other Story Shuffle 5.0 audio

James Kennedy, Chris Wink and Shannon McDonald in the story blanket fort. Photo by Rachel Playe.

All of the audio from Story Shuffle 5.0 is now up, featuring the theme of ‘I Love’ and hosted by Roxborough  farmer Rachel Playe. In her infinitely playful manner, Playe had us all tell our stories in a blanket fort she had constructed.

As if that wasn’t enough of a highlight, West Philly folk rock band Flat Mary Road was on hand for a short acoustic set.

My story — Love is like water ice: it’s so much more about the technique than the ingredients.

Or listen here.

The notes I prepared before:

  • I love water ice, and, really, water ice is a lot about love.
  • When you make water ice, an old woman once told me, it really is so much more about the technique than the ingredients.
  • I don’t know how old the woman was, maybe only in her later 50s, but her hair kept me guessing. She had a long gray pony tail, like an early winter had set in before her leaves had the chance to fall like most women do, shortening their hair as they get older.
  • Water ice is like love: you boil water and sugar, add the ingredients and freeze with the greatest and most patient of techniques

Story Shuffle 4: SNOW audio is live

Earlier this month, my friend Brian James Kirk hosted the fourth Story Shuffle, with a theme of SNOW.

Now, the audio from all 11 stories are up. Listen to mine here or find the others here.

My story was on attending a local high school basketball game where I grew up as an excited middle schooler. As a promise to myself, I prepared notes for my story the first time. I was interested to see if I felt it improved my storytelling, which was ultimately my goal in starting the event series.

So, I dashed down 10 bullet points a few hours before the event, gave it a once over and took to telling the story fresh and un-aided later.

One thing I learned in the ‘research’ phase was that the high school gymnasium of my childhood is named for a former coach and ‘the father of wrestling in New Jersey.’

In addition to the RSS feed, you can follow Story Shuffle on Twitter and Facebook.

Story Shuffle on Authority audio live

In June, I introduced Story Shuffle, the themed, first-person storytelling event.

Two months later, we hosted a second, as per our every other month schedule for the friendly story sharing night. We’re shooting to host the third in September. It’s ready to grow, so now is when we invite big shots like Eric Smith.

The theme was AUTHORITY.

Listen to mine here or the others here.

In addition to our RSS feed, you can follow Story Shuffle on Twitter and Facebook.

Story Shuffle: introducing a themed, first-person storytelling event

I like projects.

I enjoy pointing out skills, traits, knowledge sets or the like that I lack and want to develop and finding practical, fun, realistic ways to develop them as best I can — in small, attainable steps.

I love storytelling.

I want to be a better, more captivating, more experienced storyteller. I also bought a house back in December and was hunting a more original way to christen it.

With that in mind, a couple Saturdays ago, I introduced Story Shuffle to a dozen friends, mostly a cohort of former colleagues from my college newspaper days. It’s something of a themed, first-person storytelling event with lots of tasty food.

Continue reading Story Shuffle: introducing a themed, first-person storytelling event