Day 3: The Return Of The Long Story

This has been an article that should have been three days in the making but, as life would have it, took three months :) (Sadly this is how life works sometimes...and I have 6 more articles to write from my High Adventure to Atikokan, ON)

I realized that after two days in a canoe and camping in another country where there WAS NOTHING except for communicating with the people that I was with (8 Boy Scouts and three other adults), we had a lot of time. There was no phone scrolling (no reception), I had my book (this article is certainly an homage to Karen Eber , perhaps tangential) but in the intervening times, at least the adults could just chat. The morning of Day 3, we were embarking from a peninsula campsite after a second hard day of canoeing, 10 to 12 hours? Now I cannot remember. As the adult crew put in their canoe and got wet, once again, I started singing Bon Jovi's "Livin' On A Prayer" - oh half way there / oh livin on a prayer / take my hand / we'll make it I swear. One of my fellow adults, Jon, jumped in and said "They're my favorite band!". Our guide gently reminded me: "Uh, we are not actually half way there yet..." However we didnt care. We sang.

Music became a huge part of the canoe trip. At the end of Day Three, I declared to the Scouts and adults that we were making a soundtrack. Three of the eight scouts were in bands and were very into 60's and 70's era rock - right up the adults alley (tho, I was introduced to Chappel Roan, Sabrina Carpenter, Tommy Richman, and Arrogant Worms on this trip, not by the Scouts, haha). It's 151 songs. But that's for another day...

After singing Bon Jovi and, once again, having our canoe blow the scouts canoe's out of the water, we started talking about other music that we thought should be on this new-fangled soundtrack idea. We talked about Billy Joel and our favorite songs. I said that Summer, Highland Falls held much meaning to me and my wife. And then I told my story of Billy's opus to men in their 20's, Angry Young Man. My chamber choir teacher, Phil Martin (he passed away pre-pandemic), an amazing musician, was OBSESSED with HOW Billy Joel played the intro. If you're a fan, you know the sound. Well, Billy was on tour my sophomore year of high school, and "Uncle Phil" (as we called him) snagged a ticket. The next morning, HE WAS JUICED. "My ticket was behind him so I got to see him play the piano! AND I FIGURED IT OUT!" And then, he bounded to the piano and STABBED that middle C like there was no tomorrow. Not as fast, a little sloppy (as is typical except for when he played sax, his #1 instrument) but he nailed it.

As I was telling this long story, several minutes in length while we were quickly pushing through the water, leaving the Scouts in the dust, it occurred to me - we have time to let our stories breathe here. Tell them fully, leave no detail out. We have the Grace of time. And, while paddling along, I realized that we don't let ourselves tell the long story. We truncate to make time. Like many of you, I like to tell stories and anecdotes before a Zoom call starts in earnest, or when there's dead time in a conversation, or when I am trying to discuss a point I will use a story as metaphor to make a point.

We have lost that allowance to tell the long story in our everyday lives. How many will read this story to the end? We're told and trained that if a linked in article is more than 2-3 lines long, we lose the audience. And that's unfortunate. Let's tell the long story when we can.