103: Geraldine Buckley - On Telling Stories That Unite

With me, your host, Sally Koering Zimney. Together with some fabulous guests, we will have a casual conversation about the art of public speaking. Because a good talk can move the world. And it'll be fun. Yeah, I would think making alien cows meaningful, that's not a small task.

I love your giggle.

Wow. Oh my gosh. Just waiting for everybody to figure out the alphabet. Hey movers, it's Wednesday. It's Sally Koering Zimney. It's This Moved Me. I'm really pumped because today on the show I have with me a woman named Geraldine Buckley. And Geraldine was That was a recommendation from Bob Trianski, who has been on the show in the past, who's a storyteller. And after we got done with our episode, he said, "You know who you really should have on the show? You should have Geraldine Buckley on the show." And I was like, "Okay, sure." I trust all the recommendations that come from people who've been on the show because you know what we're going for here. And Geraldine is an absolute hoot. Okay, this woman is like Mary Poppins meets, I don't know, caffeine, a lot of caffeine. And she, she just has some incredible stories, and I could listen to her talk all day. We came into it a little behind because of some tech technological stuff, and I was like, I'm gonna have to keep this short, Geraldine. But in the end, I was like, keep going. Because I found her so delightful and funny. She is a storyteller, a minister, a writer, a speaker. She's a chaplain. She's worked at a prison. She travels all over the country sharing her stories and so brings so much insight and joy and experience into this conversation. I'm really thrilled to introduce you to Geraldine Buckley. Darling, where are you from?

I am originally from England, so I'm from the north of England. We're the friendly lot. But I always say all my grandparents were born in Ireland, and so I say that I'm really an Irish peasant woman with a very thin veneer of English respectability, which is very, very thin at times.

Well, I love it. Wherever you reside from, It's so great to have you on the show, and I'm just so glad that Bob connected us.

Yes, he's wonderful like that, and I am thrilled that you wanted to chat on the show, so thank you so much for inviting me.

Well, of course, of course. So Geraldine, give us the short version of how you became a storyteller and that you call yourself a storyteller.

Sally, I've really always been a storyteller, but I haven't actually used that term. So I have an Irish heritage, and it's in the blood. In my blood. But for years, I've done many different things over my life. I am an ordained minister, and so you have to use stories in preaching. But also, besides that, I've trained lots of people to speak on stages. I've written speeches for them and trained them to speak. I've raised up slam teams, performance poetry teams in South Africa. I've done all these various things, and you always use stories to encourage people, to get to know people. So stories have always been part of my arsenal, part of my professional arsenal. But I hadn't thought of myself as a storyteller until 6 years ago. Now, I was the chaplain at the largest men's prison in Maryland. I was a volunteer. I know, I know. It was not my idea. This was definitely the gods.

It's like Mary Poppins, just like, trancing into—

And I actually do have a jade green carpet bag. Yes. I was not allowed to take it to the prison. I had to learn— well, I had to learn a whole new way of being going into the prison anyway. And so I volunteered for 2 and a half years. I was the chaplain for 2 and a half years. It was definitely a God thing. But I came out exhausted. I mean, just exhausted. That kind of exhaustion where, you know, you're not going to be able to do something that's serious and deep and heavy for some time. You know, when you're bone weary, you know, that kind of exhaustion. That's where I was. And so, but I— so I'm a praying woman and I kept praying, okay, Lord, what's next? And you know, I can't have anything really huge because I need time to recuperate, but I need to make a living. And every time— I've always listened to NPR in the car— every time I turned it on, this was just before I left the prison, there would be talk about story slams. And I'd never heard of a story slam before, but I'd done lots of poetry slams. So every time I turned on the radio, there was stuff about story slams. Until after about the 8th time, I said, okay, Lord, I've got it, I've got it, I've got it. And, and I googled, and the nearest thing I found was Speakeasy DC, which said it was a storytelling club. So I went down. The theme of the night was things that happen at night, and I thought, great, everyone's going to be doing sex stories, and I'm going to be doing about the chaplain at the prison, the first time I went to prison. I thought, great, wonderful. But I'd done this slam poetry, and in fact then— I only do these poetry now in prison, and the guys love it. They were in-your-face Jesus poems in a very secular setting. Now, I don't believe in bashing anyone over the head, so it wasn't that at all, but it was just, this is how I feel, and it would be then— because I listened to other people, they would listen to me, and we had great fun discussing— it helps to have a sense of humour— discussing different points of view. But anyway, so I thought it was going to be another slam thing. So I went, and there was a wonderful response to the story. I mean, a really, really good response. It took me 6 months before I realized it was in a gay nightclub. It's a wonderful place. I know, I know, it just shows you about my radar, doesn't it? But it's a lovely place and I was hooked. I thought, I want to do this. I have no idea how, but I want to do this. So I signed up to do another story and it was on May 11th. And I remember because my birthday is May 9th and the Lord always gives me a birthday present. So I'm really talking as a chaplain here, but I mean, he does. And so I went in and I met this woman outside. And I got there really early, really, really early, because there'd been so much snow that it was difficult parking, and I'm cheap and I didn't want to go into the paid parking, basically. So I turned up early, and this other woman was there early. She was with two people who had brought her, and we started chatting. Well, cutting a long story short, it turned out that she was a professional teller. I mean, we were talking it completely complete cross-communication, because she was saying, "I'm a storyteller." I said, "Well, I'm a storyteller too." She said, "No, no, I really, really am a storyteller." I said, "Well, I'm really a storyteller." She said, "I'm telling a story tonight." I said, "So am I." Anyway, she told one first, and I told one before the interval. And it was, again, this was my birthday present, because either everyone at the interval after my story was getting up to use the restroom at the same time, or they were all desperate for an alcoholic drink, but everyone stood up and applauded. I think it was just— it was extraordinary. So people were coming and saying how wonderful it was. I was just in this haze. And she came up and she said that she was doing this workshop in Jonesborough with two international— two national storytellers. I didn't know what she was talking about. Anyway, cut a long story short, she invited me to go. I ended up going. And I met— to the storytellers, to the other storytellers, who were wonderful. And she recommended me for a festival, which was incredible because in that festival you need an hour and 45 minutes of stories. And this was just a few months later. I had two 10-minute stories, or maybe one 10-minute story and one that I was working on. But I had the folk tales. And she, in the workshop, it was very helpful 'cause I'd been a PR director. I'd been a PR director in the largest PR agency, the largest independent PR agency in London. And also I was their events director eventually. So I knew what to do. I just needed someone to tell me how to go from zero to how you get started. And she just told me the obvious things and my brain started clicking in. My brain, which had been immersed in the prison, was now coming out and remembering that I did know things about publicity. So it was really about publicity. It was— and, and it was— and she said, get a gathering of your friends. She said, tell stories, and they probably won't all be that good, but, but take bits of them and put them into a demo reel so that you can send to people. She said, you know, if it is good, you can put it on a CD and you can sell it and have some merchandise. And so I did that. I put the whole thing together in 4 months, which still amazes me.

Yeah.

It was just one of those— it's like when you're a child, you don't know what you can't do. You just plunge in. And I did. And that CD was my first CD, Destination? Slammer! which ended up getting a gold award from the storytelling world, which was huge. I mean, that was a bit later. Anyway, so I went to this festival and just things took off after that. And it was a birthday gift. What can I say? It was a book. So the doors started opening. Because before that workshop, I didn't really realize that there was a whole group of professional tellers, which is completely different to Speakeasy. Speakeasy is now Story District, and I'm still involved with them. In fact, I did a story last Tuesday for them, which is— I did my new story, I birthed my new story about my very pesky brother Damien. So I have another one, I have another one about Damien where, um, And all my stories are true. They're true. And a lot of storytellers make up a lot of details, and I don't, because the weirdest things have happened to me in my life. And I'm just so delighted. Seriously, Sally. And so I'm so delighted I now have a platform, that there was a reason they happened. Because they were way too bizarre. So anyway, the story— I won't tell you the ending, but the story that I told on the stage that day, which has kind of become my signature story, is, um, My brother and I, my parents moved to Spain when I was 11, so at this point I was about 14 and Damien was 15 and a half. We were bored. My friends had all these ex-colonial friends who, they were older than they were, but they, basically what we did was we were asked to make a sangria, you know, the lovely wine punch, for one of my parents' lunch parties, and we just wanted to get them all cheerful, these old, people. And so we Mickey Finn'd it. We poured all this other alcohol into it. But then there was— I grew up in a very Irish Catholic family, never mind the fact I was the Protestant chaplain at the largest Land Trust in Maryland. But anyway, that's a whole other story. Well, so the doorbell went and this busload of nuns turned up. They were collecting alms and my mother invited them in and insisted they had sangria. So that's one of the stories.

Oh my gosh, I love it.

So, so people were rather interested in this other story about my wicked brother.

Yeah, and the nuns and the sangria. Like, what happened?

Oh, oh, you have to listen to the story.

I will, I will. I'm so— I, I am just delighting in all of— I'm getting a picture, a clear picture of you, Geraldine, chaplain Irish Catholic turned Protestant chaplain hanging out in the men's maximum security prison.

Well, it was interesting. It took some time for us to really gel, and stories were a part of it. Now, of course, this was before I was a storyteller, or before I thought of myself as a storyteller, because that all happened at the end of it. But I went in doing creative workshops, so basically doing the slam poetry. And then getting men to do slam poetry and also art, which is incredible because I don't draw. But anyway, it was just— it was to express themselves because there's very little opportunity in a prison to express yourself. And this went— it went— they went incredible. These workshops went incredibly well. But I remember the first time I stood on the stage, and of course other guys are checking you out, and not just physically. They are very cowed, and they keep to themselves, and they have to— make sure that they can trust the person on the stage to open up. So they're not going to be someone who looks down on them or berates them, or if they're coming in in a religious capacity, they're going to presume that they're all heathens. And so they were checking me out in that way. And, um, and I'm so grateful that I passed muster. But, but when I was, um, doing the, doing the workshops, I'd say to them, you might be thinking, what on earth do we have in common? How can she possibly understand our reality? She's so different. She's white. She's from England. She's— she went to a convent boarding school. What could she possibly know about our life? And I'd say to them, if you were thinking that, you're absolutely correct, because I would know nothing. So by your words, make me understand. Paint me a picture that's so vivid that I feel as though I'm I've got my nose pressed against your grandmother's kitchen and I'm watching you eating dinner. Just make me understand with your words. And words between us did become a bridge. So I would tell stories, they would tell me stories back. And as you well know, when you hear someone's story, you completely— you think completely differently about that person. The story bypasses the brain and goes into your heart. And you see with your heart's eyes who this other person is. And it is such a powerful tool because it brings understanding, it brings unity.

Mm, I, I, what you just said right there, I think is so important. And one of the things I wanted to talk about that I've, I've read a little bit about in your, on your website and in your work and hearing you speak about it just now, but the real purpose of storytelling in your mind. Not that we use storytelling in a specific way, but oftentimes it does have that utility in a moment where you're in a room with people who you think are seemingly different. And what is it about stories that help us understand the other person? And you've talked a little bit about that, but I'm just wondering like, how, how do stories do that? How do stories establish that common ground, especially when the stories are about different lives, you know? So where's the commonality in the difference, if that makes any sense?

No, it absolutely does. And, and of course, there's two kinds of stories. There's a kind of stories that divide people and that can be used to divide, which of course I don't do. But then there's the other stories that you night, which is the ones that I love. And it's almost as though people are hardwired to hear stories. They love stories. And, and nowadays even more so than normal, because everything is a story and everything's entertainment. I mean, people— there's movies, even the news is entertainment, it's story. We are surrounded by stories. People love stories. And I think what happens is when you paint a picture with your words and the story is well crafted, people, they want to hear the ending. They drop their defenses and they listen to the story. And if it's something that is universal, and there are so many universal themes because underneath we all want the same things. We all want to be loved. We all want to be understood. And people are, it's almost as though there's a magic carpet ride and everyone is on it. And there is this huge feeling of brotherly love, really, and understanding. And everything depends on the way the story is painted. And so, and there's ways of doing that in crafting stories, which is making sure, of course, it's got a good beginning, middle, and end, that it's got an art to it, but also that the senses are brought in, that in the story you're there. You can smell things, you can see things, you can hear things. You— and the storyteller almost disappears and you are there in the story. And there's magic in that. There's absolute magic. And there's nothing like it when you are with a whole room of people and everyone is on that same journey together. It's extraordinary where the story becomes bigger than the teller. And of course that doesn't happen every time, but it is so wonderful when it does.

I completely agree with you. I used to work at an organization where we would be out giving talks to young people. So, you know, like 7th graders, 9th graders, 5th graders about things like courage and kindness and respect and wonderful. Yes. And these are big ideas that kids aren't going to necessarily necessarily be thrilled to hear you talk about it. And so of course, like, the meat of our talks were stories from our own lives. And it was amazing to— if you sat in the back of the room and you just kind of watched all the movement in the room, it'd be like, like little bobbleheads until the story started.

Yes.

And then it would stop.

Yes.

And then you'd have about like a minute or two after the story was done And then the bobbleheads would start moving again. And it was such a good exercise in keeping attention and how to draw out meaning. And essentially, like, the story was the pathway to empathy. You know, there was— when we're talking about kids' experience in school, and especially hard experiences in school, was like, that was our purpose, that was our goal, was to create empathy. Through our stories and help people see themselves in our stories or see their classmates in our stories. And without story, it's just a lecture. You know, it would have fallen on its face. Totally.

And the lovely thing about story is, from what you're saying, is that the young people are discovering those truths for themselves.

Yeah.

They're not being told, they're discovering, because they're on a journey with you. They're there with you. They're seeing the situation through your eyes and they are coming to their own conclusions. They're not being told. And so it sits into the heart.

Mm-hmm. Absolutely. So you said something earlier that I thought was really interesting. You said you birthed a new story.

Oh yes.

Tell me more about why you use that phrase and what that process is for you.

Well, sometimes it feels it, but that's exactly what you're doing. I think you take an idea, and the first CD, as I said, came very easily. But then later you're looking, I tell personal stories, as I said. So you're looking in your life and you want something that is going to connect with other people. Because what is the point about just talking about yourself and your own experiences? It has to be something that I believe that bonds people, just as we've been talking. And so I had this, this anecdote that I remember from my childhood, and it was about my brother. And people do love hearing about him, and he adores going to storytelling festivals and places where people go, "Are you Damien? Are you Damien?" They don't talk to me about the story, they want to talk to him, which is very infuriating. He said he wants to have a sign on his chest that says, "Yes, I'm Damien." But anyway, lesson learned. So there was a time when my parents— we lived in the north of England and my parents had a very successful hotel and restaurant and it was called the Stuart. And Damien is 18 months older than I am. And there he developed a huge limp and people were terrified of polio. And basically the hotel and restaurant were almost closed down because of it. They were almost put into quarantine. So that's the tiny little bit I knew about the story. So I went and talked to Damien. I got his memory. So, and then he told me— I completely forgotten— he'd been born with spina bifida, had an operation, and the specialist— the first time I knew it until I talked to him a few weeks ago— that the specialist called my mother every year to find out if he developed any problems walking. And so between the two of us, the memory grew. And then I did lots of research on polio. And people were terrified at that time because it was 2 years before the vaccine came in that wiped it out of England. And then also I thought, why was my parents' hotel so success— successful? And they'd started it just after rationing was stopped in England. So the war stopped in 1945, but Britain had rationing for 10 years afterwards where you could only have 4 ounces of meat. And so they— this was just after rationing, and they advertised T-bone steaks, which was huge. I mean, if you've only had 4 ounces of meat a week, you're only allowed 4 ounces a week of meat, and suddenly you've got a huge T-bone steak on your plate. People flopped, especially when they said, "If you could eat one, you could have another one." So it was— and they didn't do those kind of things in England. So I was doing research on that because I wanted those themes, the theme of polio and the fear of— of a disease, and my brother didn't have it. I mean, I'm ruining the story, but he didn't have it. It turned out he was imitating my great-aunt who had rheumatoid arthritis, and I completely ruined that story for everyone. The little, the little, the little so-and-so. But basically, it's taking that small memory and then building it. So everything in there is true, but I just put in other streams. So doing the research on the polio, and also in a way, the importance of vaccinations because so many people had died because of polio. There'd been 5 epidemics and multiple people, especially children, had died or they were left in callipers and wheelchairs or they were left in iron lungs, those machines which completely covered you except for the child's head which stuck out of it. People would be in there for days or weeks or months and they were iron lungs and, And just the terror, the absolute terror of this disease, which wasn't stopped all that long ago. And we— people are discussing vaccinations now, and so it's relevant for that, for that reason. And of course, I always try and inject humour, and that no matter what my pesky, pesky brother does— and he's done dreadful things over the years, so I make people laugh about the things that he's done. But I'm still grateful that I have a brother. So basically it's building the story into something that would connect with other people. Having a sibling that drives you nuts but you still love them. The fear of a disease coming and taking away your livelihood. I mean, that's very relevant with the refugee crisis, when suddenly everything is taken away. So it's trying to build in streams into a story How do I craft a story that is essentially funny, that will resonate with other people, that they will want to listen? And what happens when you do craft a story, and if you do it well, which is what one hopes— you don't know if you've done it well until you've tried it out in front of an audience, but— that people stop seeing you and they start seeing— they're putting their own circumstances through the filter of the story. So basically they have a movie going on in their head of their experiences as they're listening to the story. So it's like two things going on in someone's brain at the same time. And you're listening to the story and you can work out how you feel about some of these situations, maybe about vaccinations, maybe about immigration, maybe just hearing a story and you have your own thoughts and you're putting it through that filter and you can come away at the end of the story with a whole different perception on your problems. Or on situations that you've been grappling with. And other stories aren't that heavy. They just make people laugh, because sometimes that is what people need to do. They need to take a vacation from their problems. They need for that moment for the problem to be lifted off their shoulder. And I think laughter is a gift, and I love making people laugh. So I like to think that my stories make people laugh and think.

Mm. I— Completely agree with you. I think laughter is so essential, and a lot of times I think especially when speakers are in the mode of really wanting to inspire people and wanting to move them, I mean, that's the audience of this Move Me, people who really want to move their audience. It can take on a really serious tone, like this is big deal, this is big time stuff, when really we have to have a lightness about it too, because people can take that in more. There's— when you're enjoying yourself and laughing and delighting in the words and in the memory and in the story, then they can come with you more easily, I think. Because, you know, a really serious story is sometimes just too hard for people to take in. There's resistance to that sometimes, I think.

I think laughter is essential. I always, certainly in Christian circles, talk about it as a Holy Spirit sandwich, but just, I mean, a sandwich will be fine. So you open people up with laughter and then you get in the deep points that you need and then you seal those deep points in with laughter. And so people open up because of the laughter and they retain it because of the laughter. But it's not Machiavellian. There's a point where there's only— as exactly as you've said, Sally Koering Zimney, people can only take so much seriousness. And there's another thing about laughter is if you can get people laughing, they like you. They, they, they are then more likely to open up. They're more likely to let those pictures go in their head, to let their defenses drop. They think, this is someone I can be safe with. And if, if they then feel safe with you, you can get some serious points across as long as you then seal it up with laughter. And with stories, you have to be very careful of, of respecting your audience and bringing them back to a safe place. So, and also, I think it's very important with, with stories that if it's a— certainly if it's a true story, but really, I suppose, any kind of story that's got deep content in, you need to have processed that yourself. You need to have done the work. So And when you say birthing the story, that's part of it. So can— if there's— if it's a story that's about somebody who's died or somebody who's been— you've had a difficult relationship with, have you done the hard work? Have you done the grief work to be able to tell that story and stand up and not cry and not show the audience deep emotion? Just— or overwhelming emotion, because with an audience they have to feel safe. So if they see that you're breaking down on the stage, they close up because they want to be protective towards you. If they see that you have that deep emotion but you are in control, it allows them to relax and to feel their own emotions. So one has got to be very careful with an audience that you— I love to start people off laughing. You take them to a deep place. But you deliver them back safely again. That's very important.

I think that's really important what you just said. I've done some writing about speakers who I have watched when I've said, this talk is not ready for public yet because it is still so raw. It is too hard for you to share this And exactly what you're talking about, that when the audience is experiencing that, they're taken out of the experience of hearing it and are all of a sudden watching you as a presenter, performer, rather than being with you in the story. It creates this divide between the audience. And so it is that balance of being in the moment and feeling it without letting it overtake you. It's tricky.

It really is. Now, I have seen really excellent professional storytellers on the stage at Jonesbridge, the National Storytelling Festival. That's the heart of one stream of storytelling in the country. And I saw this particular person, and I know I know them well, and they were telling a story about their parents, and something very raw came up, and they broke down in tears on the stage. Now, this was near the end of the festival. People absolutely loved this person. They loved the person, and so they were very patient, and it didn't ruin the moment. They came down, they were sitting next to me, and they said, "I should never have told that. I wasn't ready." But they got away with it because of the body of work they already have and the great affection the audience already has for them. Mm-hmm.

That's interesting.

And the fact that this audience understands story. But otherwise, it's really not fair because the spotlight is then on you and your agony or the difficulty you are having and not on the audience. So storytelling needs to be generous. It's a gift you're giving people rather than having a spotlight on yourself.

Yeah. That's really, I think, really important conversation we're having here. Um, and there, there's so much more to say about it. So I'm going to include a link to some of the writing that I've done about it. And also some of the articles that I reference where people are really struggling with that same idea. What is, how How can we be authentic when we are having those feelings on stage in a way that brings the audience in and doesn't push them away from us?

Cool.

All right. Well, it's really interesting that we've just been talking about this because it is time for a This Moved Me moment. Geraldine, if you're not familiar, Every time I'm on the show, I do a This Moved Me moment and have my guests share this moved me moment, something that has moved you recently, because I think it's so important for us as speakers and creatives to be really connected to what's moving us so that we can move our audiences as well. So I'm gonna start actually because it sort of riffs on what we were just talking about. Before we even got into this conversation, I have on my, on my little notes sheet here that I want to talk about this moment that happened on American Idol. Do you watch American Idol at all?

Occasionally. I don't have— I have a master's degree in television and I don't own a television.

That's okay. It's okay. You know, a lot of people have fallen away from American Idol, but there's something that keeps pulling me back. And I think this year in particular, because it's the final year, and for a long time American Idol was just like a something that we all gathered around the TV to watch, and not really anymore. But, but there was a moment in the show, I don't know if it was last week, I think it was last week, where Kelly Clarkson, who was like the season 1 winner, and she's this powerhouse singer Well, they brought her back for this one episode to kind of be on the panel of judges and also to sing from her new album. And she has this song called "Piece by Piece." And she's very pregnant at the moment. I think that's an important context. She's probably 8 months pregnant. And she is feeling this nostalgia of— the end of this era of American Idol, and then she is singing this very personal song that she wrote when she was pregnant with her first child and, and, um, and is currently pregnant obviously with her second child. So, um, this song is about her father and how he left them when they were little, young, and how she has— he's, he's, from what I'm gathering in the song, he's trying to come back into her life now that she has everything together and asks for money. And, and this song is really about her husband and how piece by piece he's helping her believe in the goodness of men and the goodness of fathers. And it's this— it's, it's a beautiful song. But what I was watching as she was up there singing was her becoming really emotional, overcome with emotion. But she sort of powered through it. There was one moment where she had to— she had to stop and take a breath, and the pianist kind of hung with her, and It wasn't awkward in any way. It drew me into her. And so it stands out to me as one of those moments where she is such a consummate professional, but I was with her as she was re-experiencing this moment with her dad. And the lyrics are really beautiful. So it's a really gorgeous take on the song.. And you're— what, you know, the, the judges are crying. And when they said, like, why did that impact you so much? To Keith Urban, one of the judges, and he said, I'm a dad. And that's it. I'm a dad. Like, how can you not be moved by this? And sometimes we— when we listen to music, we're not taking in the story of it. But there was such a story in this song. And because we're watching She wrote it. This is her story, and she herself is about to become a mother again, so she is just in the thick of it. It was really beautiful, and it runs antithetical to what I was saying before, that in that, um, sometimes it feels like those kinds of stories you've got to be careful about when you're ready to share them. And this, the rawness of it, actually pulled me in. Yeah. I'll put the links on the, um, show notes so people can go and find that and watch it. There's a YouTube video of it, but it's just powerful.

That sounds amazing. That is an amazing moment. And of course that goes against what we've just been saying about, um, about not being moved, uh, yourself, except I'm just wondering if the, if singing and storytelling is, is different. Of course, it's so— it's performing, but the singing is— it's shorter and more intense. This is from someone who is not a singer, who was— who was my— in fact, not musical. My piano teacher when I was 12 burst into tears and begged me to give it up. Auditioned for choir between the ages of 6 and 11, 5 times, and they turned me down each time.

So you kept auditioning?

You're so cute. And got a good story out of it. But, um, yeah, you may be right.

It may be just that, you know, music itself can be so emotive.

Yes.

Regardless of what you're saying or what it's about. So I think there's a lot of that that's just inherent.

And that she was really connecting with it. Um, so often I think when we, we do something over and over again, which of course a singer is of her caliber is going to be performing a song over and over again. And of course, speakers do the same thing. And I did remember one time I was at a Toastmasters convention, some ages ago, before I got into storytelling, and I've forgotten the name of the guy, but he told this wonderful story about his son, and it was just so moving. His son was actually in the room, and it was an incredibly moving story. And it's really bad because I can't remember the details, details, but it was very, very moving and he told it beautifully. And it was the speech that he had won— wasn't a story, it was a speech— and it was the speech that he had won the World Festival. So he was a worldwide known speaker, particularly because of this story. So I went up to him afterwards, and I don't usually go up to speakers afterwards, I just don't, but I really felt I had to. And I said to him, I said, "How can you keep it so fresh? You told it so well, but you must have told it hundreds and hundreds of times. How do you keep it fresh?" And he started to give me a trite answer, and then he stopped and he said, "I knew my son and his friend were going to be in the room, and that was really important to me." He said, "So I went over that story image by image, and I relived it in my mind just before I went on, and so it's fresh and real." to me as though it had just happened. He said it, and so he was able then to deliver the speech in a way that was fresh, very, very fresh. And I said, "And did your son like it?" And he said, "Yes." In fact, I'd seen the son, and you could almost see him. I was sitting behind him, but you could almost see the hairs on the back of his neck smiling. You know, you can tell, you can tell, and the shoulders are so— but like, this is my dad, this. Yes, yes.

So yes, that's great. Well, that, um, that could be your This Moved Me moment, Geraldine. I don't know if you have a different one, but I loved that right there.

Uh, yes, I— well, that's some time ago. I mean, it's, it's, it really did move me because It was before I started at the prison, which sounds terrible, doesn't it? They let me out for good, or was it bad behavior? Yes, so I really remember that. I think it was incredibly solid advice. And again, when somebody gives you that kind of advice, it goes deep into you, which is like the story. He told me a story of how his speeches— how his speech had new life. And so that went deep into me. And I think one of the things about those kind of stories that have an arrow that go into you is that you remember them when you need them. You might not think about them for years, but then if you need that advice, it will just come up from the inside of you. It will flood your mind. You'll remember it.

You are a delight.

Thank you so much for inviting me, and I've loved talking to you. Bless you, Sally Koering Zimney.

Alright everybody, that's it for me on This Moved Me, and I have some exciting news. I think it's really exciting because I didn't really know anything like this existed, but it does. You guys, there is this page, this place out on the internet called Patreon, P-A-T-R-E-O-N, and that is a place where you can go to support artists and creatives who are doing work that isn't necessarily easy to support, right? Free work like a podcast.

Woohoo!

So you know what, this is sort of a you know, an attempt, a try. I'm throwing it out there. As you know, this is a passion of mine, my, my work, my hobby. I love doing this podcast. It is, it has been so fulfilling and so fun for me, but it would be really helpful if it also did not just cost money, but also, you know, brought in some money. So, you know what, In— inspired by Amanda Palmer and those artists who so boldly put themselves out there and say, "Hey, I've made something. I think it's worthwhile. If you agree, here's how you can support me." So that's what I'm saying right now. Hi guys, I have made this podcast. I hope it's worthwhile to you. If you feel like it is, I would be so honored and so grateful for your support. And it doesn't take a lot. I'm talking like a dollar an episode. If you feel like that's worthwhile for you, then you can head over to patreon.com/thismovedme, and it's all set up really easy for you to just become an ongoing contributing member of this community. Community and to support my work, which would mean the world to me. I'm so grateful for you and everything that you're doing, and thanks. I love bubbly water. I just love it.

Ah!

Can you hear it bubble? Wait, let me see if I can do this. I totally heard it!

That's weird.