StoryCorps is declaring November 28, 2008 the first annual National Day of Listening.

This holiday season, ask the people around you about their lives — it could be your grandmother, a teacher, or someone from the neighborhood. By listening to their stories, you will be telling them that they matter and they won’t ever be forgotten. It may be the most meaningful time you spend this year.

“StoryCorps is an independent nonprofit that has helped more than 40,000 Americans record their stories. As one of the largest oral history projects of its kind, it is our mission to help people honor and celebrate one another’s lives through listening.”

So, if you are looking for a new way to add meaning to a holiday that is quickly being overrun by all of the shopping sales on “Black Friday”, I invite you to consider this. The StoryCorps page at www.npr.org has a downloadable kit to help you ask your loved ones to tell their stories.

Still not sure quite what it is, but my friend Jill has challenged me. Who can resist?
She “tagged” me to do this thing where I’m supposed to blog about “six uninteresting things about me.” It’s called a meme. “For those of you who don’t know what a meme is, you can read this site that explains it in detail. Or I’ll just tell you: it’s a bunch of questions someone with a blog answers and then tags some other people with blogs and they answer the same questions and so on and so forth.”
1. Despite my current level of extrovertedness, I used to be paralyzingly shy. I once (in 4th grade) hid in my friend Sarah Wolf’s hedge because I was afraid to talk to some boys who came down the street.
2. The Shibboleth episode of The West Wing makes me cry. Every time. It is the one where my president gives Charlie the turkey carving knife made by Paul Revere and then handed down in the Bartlett family ever since. It also has the Chinese Christian immigrants and CJ having to lead children in song and babysit turkeys. Best ever.
3. I drove a white 1974 Ford Pinto in high school. It was not very cool, but I could fit my great dane and my cello in the back. I sold it for more money than my parents paid for it.
4. I was on Romper Room when I was 4 years old.
5. At Girls State, in 1986, I was elected to attend Girls’ Nation. I think the elected me because I wore suits. I met President Reagan in the White House. He told us to support Star Wars when we were old enough to vote.
6. I really like labyrinths. They are not the same as mazes.