You and Me, We Story

A long time ago when I was just a wee nipper, a travelling priest came to visit our Catholic primary or intermediate school.  He spoke about how in the culture that he was living in, I really for the life of me cannot remember where he was missioning, that it was the custom to sit and tell stories upon meeting a new person.  He said it was through story telling that you learnt about a person’s life, their past, their future and their families.  He said that the direct translation of the words that they used was ‘You and Me, We story’.

I often think of this travelling priest and just how right he was, now that I am traveller myself, however not a priest.  Often when I meet a new person we sit telling stories about our families (maybe this is just a traveller thing), about the places we have visited, the people who are important to us, the things that we have done and want to do.  Without sounding cheesy, our hopes, dreams, loves past and present, and what we want for our future.

So at this stage when I am constantly meeting new people here are a few of the funny stories that I have been telling or have recently remembered.

• ·         My friend Elissa is currently visiting London and staying with me.  The very first time I met Elissa, I was in my parent’s pantry, I was probably about 17.  It was late at night and I was in my jammies and back then my hair was white blonde.  My sister and brother both have very dark hair.  Elissa, came in with my sister and Paula introduced her to me.  She began to speak to me very slowly.  ‘How a r e  y o u?’  ‘I’m fine’ I replied.  She then asked me how I liked it here.  At this point my sister stepped in and said umm what are you doing?  Elissa and I were both looking very confused.  Is this not your Scandinavian exchange student? She asked.  Ummm no this is my sister, not my host sister, my actual sister, Paula replied.  From that time on I have been known to her as the Scandi sister and we joke about it often.  There are numerous facebook posts in Scandinavian that we have to Google translate and lots of Ja’s. 

• ·         The time I was walking back from the train, and as I neared our road, my Dad was pulling out in his ute.  He beckoned to me to come and talk to him.  I was wearing what was a trendy satchel at the time.  It was full of my heavy uni books.  As I stepped out to begin to run to him, the bag swung forward and the momentum caused me to fall.  He of course drove to me, pulled over and got out to help me.  However, just before he got there, a very kind lady pulled over to help as well, when my Dad went to pick me up off the pavement, she batted him away with her handbag and basically told him to get lost.  I had to kindly explain that he was my Dad, and she got embarrassed and left before I could thank her.  But I still laugh about her batting my Dad away.  I still have a scar on my elbow from the experience.

• ·         When I was at high school, we were playing Petanque on the field.  My friends and I thought that it would be a fun idea to play Braveheart with the boules.  I was holding a boule in my hand when my friend ran to me with one also in her hand.  My little finger got bashed between the boules and it broke, it really hurt.  Even my doctor was laughing at me, he reckoned it was possibly the one and only injury from Petanque.

• ·         My parent’s pantry is the stuff of legends, my friends love going in there, I love going in there.  I used to love shutting myself in there, and when Sam who was about two at the time, would toddle past, I would jump out and scare the living daylights out of him.  He would jump in the air and shake.  I would be in fits and he would have a giggle too.  Then we would both get in there and scare Nana.  But the best pantry story was when my parents were away one weekend.  My besties were over and for some reason I had to pop out.  My friend Sandie was driving me somewhere, possibly to the supermarket.  When we got back, the pantry had moved to the living room to decorate it.  There were candy canes on the curtain rods, there were statues holding muesli bars and just food everywhere.  It was hilarious.  Thankfully my parents saw the humour as we were finding food for the next few days.

There are of course many more of these stories, the best ones of course are not publishable.  But I guess that the point is that to get to know someone you get to hear their stories.  If you know them long enough you get the juicy ones.   One of my friends often says to me – Nic keep living it, we love hearing the stories, remember I am married and have a baby now, I am living vicariously through you.  So I keep living a life that creates stories that people want to hear.  Which brings me to the cheesy ending and the moral, just like every story should have – Live it so that when you are old, you can amaze your grandkids with what you have done!