Alive...Mostly also, Sherry Lovett Is On Deck!

Well, it is done.  Both of my children are flown from the nest.  My daughter is safely ensconced at boarding school.

My son is in college.

I'm at home with this guy I married almost twenty years ago.

The week before my children left, I posted a number of stories about them on Facebook.  Once I wrote them out and posted them I could laugh, cry, and enjoy snatches of memory, and share them with others who know them in person, or watched them grow up online.

Here is one of the tales.

Surrounded by Angels

Darith 3 Devin 5

Devin was learning about beginning and ending sounds to work on his spelling. He was saying things like, 'bird begins with 'b' and he'd make the 'b' sound, and ends with 'd' and he'd make the 'd' sound. Darith found this annoying, because she wasn't learning this in her class. So, she jumped in with her own word.

Dar - 'My name is Darif. It begins with 'D' and ends with 'F' and she made the sounds, but didn't say the letters.

I considered letting it go, but decided not to. "Actually, honey," I told her, "your name is Dari-'th'." I made the 'th' sound very hard. I figured that if she couldn't make the sound of 'th' then we might as well begin to work on that now, helping her hear it. 

She sat in the back seat for a few shocked seconds. Then...

Dar - My name is Dari-'th'? (She made the sound perfectly)

me - (surprised) Yes.

Dar - Dari-'th'?

me - Yes.

In the days to come it was obvious she was annoyed that we hadn't corrected this error earlier. She would come to me every now and then with a word that ended in either 'th' or 'f' and demand I make sure she was saying it properly. I should have realized she was an unusual person at that point. Parents are slow learners.

As I've said more than a few times this summer, the transition I've been dealing with has been challenging.  Not for my kids, no, they are ready to go, but for me.

If you do your job right, they leave.  That doesn't make it any easier.

It is, therefore, only fitting that my next guest blogger is none other than the lyrical Sherry Lovett.  

Sherry Lovett

If ever there was a teller who told from her heart, and moved through the world with story, it surely must be Sherry Lovett. 

 She is an active member of the North Carolina Storyteller's Guild, organizes the Toe River Storytelling festival, and is helping organize the Heart of North Carolina Storytelling Festival.

Sherry also writes a blog called Life...You Gotta Lovett about raising a precocious homeschooled child, being married to the caretaker at the beautiful Wildacres Retreat in Little Switzerland, NC where the North Carolina Storytelling Guild holds its annual retreat, caring for an elderly parent, and telling stories in her free time!

By the way, if you are interested in more information about the retreats with NCSG, then just click the link!

Here is her official Bio for those of you who have not been lucky enough to encounter her.

Sherry has been a storyteller for twelve years starting when she was a middle school teacher. She quickly discovered the power of stories within a classroom to create enthusiasm for learning. She began to explore the craft in earnest after the birth of her daughter, when she became a stay-at-home mom and a professional storyteller. The thing that draws Sherry to storytelling is the magical ability of stories to shine the light on our interrelatedness – the connection of people with people and people with nature – and by this awareness to create more harmony in the world. Sherry Lovett tells a variety of stories including folktales, Native American tales, scary stories, and fairy tales, using precise language, eloquent movement, and dramatic voices to bring the stories to life.

Sherry's piece entitled: The Stories We Tell Are The Stories We Need is a look at how our pursuit of certain stories mirrors what is happening in our own lives.

I certainly lived that out over the last few months!

Stop by next week and enjoy an interesting perspective on how we end up building the stories that resonant in our souls.

(I don't know where this storytelling took place, but the 'audience' seems to be a roving type situation.  Ignore the noise and let the story take you where it will!)



Happy Telling!