Tuesday at 1 p.m., I’ve been invited to teach a story-telling workshop at the Mansion. I am eager to do this. I love hearing the stories of the residents, they are the stories of life, and many have been forgotten. Sylvie traveled the world as a diplomat’s daughter. Connie teamed up with a friend to start a fiber arts business. Madeline’s father was killed by her brother to stop his awful abuse of the family, and she was sent to an orphanage.

My workshop is about an hour, but it is the launch of a month long story telling initiative that I have launched with Julie Smith, the Mansion Activities Director. I’m going to talk about elemental story structure and ask the residents to pick a story from their lives, and then write them down.

We will have a reading and awards ceremony at the end of the month in the Great Room at the edge of the Mansion building.

This will be a challenge to my teaching and my idea of teaching. I talked to some of the residents today, they are eager for direction and passionate about telling their stories, it is a new way for me to teach and to think about stories, and I hope to share or somehow publish their stories at the end of the month.

I will tell the about simple story structure, and then ask them to consider a story from their own lives that helps explain who they are. Stories are so essential for people living at the edge of life, they often look back and review their lives, but it is difficult to find anyone who will listen or who wants to hear

I hope to excite them with the idea that people will listen. When I came to visit today with Red, Sylvie was sitting on the coach reading letters and responding “I’m writing to Luann Sanders,” she told me, and I knew the name write away. Luanne is a reader of the blog and a great friend of The Mansion. She has written many letters, sent many gifts, even driven to Cambridge to visit the residents.

Sylvie says she is visiting soon and wanted to write her. The Mansion letters much appreciate your letters, you can  write them c/o The Mansion, 11 S. Union Avenue, Cambridge, N.Y., 12816. I so look forward to hearing the stories of the Mansion residents. I mean to tell them that their stories matter.