the stories we tell

Greg always calls me a "story-topper," and not in the nice "hey, you're such a great story topper!" sort of way. I think he may be under this impression because I have a super good memory for fantastic stories, and it gets triggered when I'm hearing someone recant a story of their own. This, my dear, is called a CONVERSATION. On Easter Sunday we were at my parents' place, and my brother was telling us about how he had to go to the ER the day before, for ulcer related issues. I listened intently, commented accordingly, paused respectfully, then said, "Did I ever tell you about my almost concussion?" Greg groaned, "No, you're not going to tell this now!" To which I responded, "Sweet Cheeks, it would be remiss if I didn't, I've given him the tag-line, we can't leave him hanging." Sometimes I think Greg doesn't understand basic human interactions.

Which reminds me I never told you this story, my bad.

It was spring break, and the kids were playing outside. Michigan is known for it's long winters, and any sign of the sun and spring feels like a sheet being pulled off of an old dusty couch. I had just picked up from my delectably healthy dinner, and decided I'd do a little weeding outside. (The only outdoor work I tend to do, as I do not enjoy outdoor work per se.) Because Greg had just spread wood chips around our flower bed, I grabbed the broom to sweep away the stray pieces. I swept as I walked, my head down. I don't know if I heard the thud first or felt the pain, but I stood momentarily dizzy, realizing that I'd just rammed my head into a solid wood beam that jets out from our house. I dropped the broom and put my hand to my head––blood. I walked quickly into the house and said to Greg, "I'm bleeding, where am I bleeding from?" He began his litany of standard Greg-type questions. What did you hit? You walked in to the house? How did you do that? I sat down at the kitchen table, but just as we got the bleeding to stop, I suddenly felt hot and nauseous. I said, "I don't feel so well" to which Greg said, "I don't feel great either!" I lay down and waited for myself to either throw up or pass out, but neither happened. Oddly enough I never did get even a headache (which makes this story rather anti-climactic), but I had Greg call his brother Paul (who's an ER nurse) to see if he should wake me up every hour at night to make sure I didn't die. Paul said that wasn't necessary, so I went outside and slowly finished sweeping.

And that, is how you tell a story.

To a certain extent, stories are like fine wine and lasagna, they get better over time. Sure, we may lose some of the details and "facts" but every time you tell a story, you take mental notes on what worked and what didn't. Some stories need to be thrown out if they don't have staying power, but at our home we like to make sure they're super dead before giving up. For example, I took the girls to Captain Sundae last Saturday, and while we were waiting for our order, I saw that the worker was scooping Superman ice cream into a regular cone. Because I knew Elia had ordered a waffle cone, I stuck my head around the freezer and said, "Uh, if that's my order, we got the waffle cone." But then the whole way home, I replayed the scenario in different (teenage/valley girl) accents, "Uh, you'd best not be planning on handing that to me, my daughter only likes her Superman ice cream in a cone with waffles on it..." until there was not a laugh left to be had. That story had to die, or so I was told. Sometimes you simply had to be there, I guess that's why there's such a thing as 'inside jokes', and they need to stay inside where they belong. And this 'story' just doesn't have the staying power to be a family story that we tell for years to come. ("Tell us about the waffle cone again, Grandma!")

They say that people who tell stories together stay together. (Don't "they" say that?) Like we're sharing a narrative. In fact, this article from Psychology Today states that children who know a lot about their family history have a higher feeling of capability and control. Not only that, but family who share stories, feel less anxiety and depression than those who do not talk about the past. (So I guess what I'm hearing here is a go-ahead on the near-concussion story?)

I love family stories. The story of how my parents met, the time my dad took

me as a baby to a faculty meeting, and he said something funny and I laughed at him, or how the Navy taught my grandpa to swim by throwing him into the water. Some of my favorite times are when we're sitting around with family talking about a past I don't remember, or wasn't there for. Like the time my Dad saved my Aunt Marcia from drowning, or when, another aunt served company a pie that still had the wax paper lining on the crust. (I just can't remember which one, I have a lot of aunts!)

At our last Nieuwsma reunion I learned that my dad (the oldest of ten kids) spent the first several years of his life in a small house that had no indoor bathroom. (The person I feel the most for in this scenario is my grandma--

raising 4 kids in cloth diapers and no indoor bathroom!) My Uncle Len tells of the first time he'd met me: I was around three, and I was peeing in our back yard. When my mom asked why I would do this, I said, "Well, Josh does it!" And my favorite claim to fame story is of my dad's grandma, who came from the Netherlands when she was eight, on a ship that was called over to help rescue people from the Titanic. They were all told to stay below deck, but my great-grandma wandered up and saw the bodies floating in the water.

Sometimes family stories are the only way we get to know people. My mom's sister, Patricia, died before I was born, and I can only piece together what she was like from different stories I hear here and there (my mom isn't one to tell long stories, or to try to garner a lot of attention, so I take after her in this way). Once, many years ago, my grandma told me about the time Aunt Patricia was in the hospital (from a virus they never quite figured out), and she had gone to be with her and knew she wouldn't make it, but then read a Bible verse that was written on the wall of the hospital and knew God was telling her something. I so badly wish I remembered what the verse was, or what God was telling my Grandma, but I don't, and

my Grandma doesn't have this memory anymore. I just remember that when she told me this, I cried. The stories on my mom's side seem to be quite often sad. I learned too, that this grandma's mom had a stroke when she was around 60, and as her husband went to call 911, he died of a heart attack. My mom's dad (picture on the left here, the one the Navy threw into the water) was in a car accident while taking my Uncle Tim to the orthodontist, and spent the last 25 years of his life as a quadriplegic. Maybe there is a reason my mom doesn't tell long stories.

My favorite story of Greg is when he was drinking juice as a little boy, and his mom told him to stay in the kitchen. He slowly walked over toward the living room, stuck one foot in the living room and one in the kitchen, and slowly drank his juice while looking straight at his Mom. I tell the story like I was there, and I can picture it, though in all honesty, this is not my story to tell, as I was in Ontario, Canada, at the time. I hate it when I start to tell someone's story back to them. (Though in many cases I'd probably tell it better.)

My kids sometimes beg us to tell certain stories--mostly of them as kids. Like the time Greg went to The Dominican Republic for 10 days on a mission trip, leaving me with two little rugrats. The very first day someone locked the bathroom door shut (with no one inside), so I punished Elia (though later found out Kate had done it) and had to take the handle off the door to get in. As soon as this was taken care of, I went outside to find Elia standing naked in a bucket of water. It was a long week. Another favorite is when the smoke detector in their room started saying "Low battery" in the middle of the night, and startled Kate so much that she wouldn't walk into a room with a smoke detector in it for a good year. Or when our pastor dressed up as King Darius for a play of Daniel and the lion's den, and Elia was so terrified and thought he was God. She would ask the nursery workers nervously, "Is God here?" every time we dropped her off. (We finally caved and would discretely shake our heads no.) Kate also enjoys the story of the time we thought she'd died. (I do not enjoy this story as much.) She was maybe three weeks old and

Greg was putting her down in her crib around 11pm when she went limp. He came running into the living room calling my name, and he rubbed her and screamed her name as I went to get some water from the bathroom to throw on her before she came to. Long story short, we took her to the ER and they said it was probably valsalva syncope (where she held her breath and passed out), and that it was odd at such a young age. But for those 30-45 seconds we thought this little girl who had just rocked our world (in mostly hard ways) was dead, and that was enough time for me to wonder if we'd have the funeral in Michigan or in California, and also to know that I wanted to die with her. So yeah, a good bedtime story.

I heard once that women need to tell their (giving) birth stories a certain number of times so they can process this highly emotional event. Maybe that's what we're all doing, processing highly emotional events and making sense of what has happened to us, and how we fit into the picture. Maybe Kate needs to hear the we-thought-she-had-died story so she can hear how we processed this information and how important she is to us? Maybe I need to hear stories of my parents and grandparents when they were young so I can make connections to them and to the past? And just maybe, if someone tells me she's pregnant, I shouldn't right away ask if she's heard how we announced our pregnancy with Kate. Not the right time? Well then, you let me know when a good time would be, cause have I got a story for you!