Our stories and our environment spin
each other reflexively. Both change endlessly in an intimate dance of
culture. I have been reminded of this fact by a recent notification
from Twitter about a storyteller with a banjo.
When I was a teenager, I the good
fortune to be able to hear live music on a regular basis. I lived
outside of Washington, DC so attending concerts by the Beatles,
Rolling Stones, Andres Segovia, Arthur Rubenstein, Steve Goodman, the
Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem, and Peter, Paul and Mary was as
simple as buying tickets. I thought I was just hearing good music,
impressing my dates and tending to my libido. It never occurred to me
that interacting with culture was shaping me as a storyteller or that
I had the ability to alter my culture and environment.
