Telling Quotes

The best Christmas present you can give to your dead grandfather is not showing up until Easter. And telling no one about it. Especially not yourself.

Because of the consequences of trying to be heard as a child, many adults are unable to take the risk of telling as adults. The fear of the consequences is almost debilitating. The abusers and controllers know that; they rely on it.

I excuse myself and go to the ladies’ room. Washing my hands, I give myself a little youcan do this type pep talk. When I walk out, I see him leaned up against the wall opposite the door."Long line for the men's room?" I try to joke, moving past him.His hand circles my wrist, stopping me. I inhale, frozen in place. My back is to him. I don'ttry to pull away. I can't move. I just look down at his hand, staring at his damn freckle."Sarah.""What are you playing at, Will?'"Playing?" He tugs my arm back so I'm facing him. "I promise you this is no game.""Alright, what do you want from me? Is that better?" I practically spit."Everything." He's moved his hands up to hold my biceps. "I want everything from you."Everything. That one word still breaks my heart when I think back to that night.My head snaps back as though he's struck me. Don’t cry, just don’t cry. "I gave youeverything once. Now I have nothing left for you."I pull myself from his grasp and hurry back to the table.

The telling and the hearing of a story is not a simple act. The one who tells must reach down into deeper layers of the self, reviving old feelings, reviewing the past. Whatever is retrieved is reworked into a new form, one that narrates events and gives the listener a path through these events that leads to some fragment of wisdom. The one who hears takes the story in, even to a place not visible or conscious to the mind, yet there. In this inner place a story from another life suffers a subtle change. As it enters the memory of the listener it is augmented by reflection, by other memories, and even the body hearing and responding in the moment of the telling. By such transmissions, consciousness is woven.