The Daily Honky Tonk 203rd Edition

The Daily Honky Tonk
203rd Edition
June 6, 2014
7:30 AM

The Personal Narrative- Part 1

    If you ever watch one of those reality show competitions (The Voice, Chopped, The Next Iron Chef), you always get several personalities who are scripted to say something like, “I know my whole life has led up to this moment, and if I win, I will know I was doing the right thing.  It will really validate to others that what I have been doing is right.”  Somehow, their life is defined by the moment.  They were always preparing for this competition that didn’t exist when they were little kids.

    Despite my incredulity towards reality shows, I do think the stories we tell about ourselves matter.  A couple of months ago, I was listening to an episode of This American Life in which a rather successful man tells Ira Glass how he progressed.  He credits all his life’s highest points to plagiarizing a paper as an elementary student.  His English teacher was so impressed she used it to recommend him to a private school, away from the problems of the public school.  His whole life hinged on this moment.  Without the private school, he believed he would never have gotten anywhere.  Curious about the teacher, Ira had a private investigator searching six months until the lady was found.  She recalled the student, but viewed the story differently.  She couldn’t remember one particular paper, she just recalls the young man being on track for success in general – based on that she recommended him. But her recollection was that the school wasn’t that bad and he would have succeeded anyway.  The two narratives of the young man’s life differ significantly.  When Ira asked whether this new knowledge changed how the man felt about himself, he explained that he preferred his version of the story.

    This really got me thinking about the stories we tell about ourselves.  Many people believe life has some kind of purpose and that they are meant to fulfill some sort of mission during their time on earth.  It is only natural that people would look for that guidance and connect the pieces of their lives to explain where they are.  Some see themselves as the epic hero in their story, while others see themselves as the embattled victim of defeat after defeat, and most fall somewhere in between the two extremes.  In any case, people tend to see their life as a narrative of connected events.

    I started to consider the personal narratives I tell myself.

    Here is the personal narrative that explains why I became a teacher.  When I was little, I would stay up late at night reading books in bed.  I would wait until the house was quiet, and then turn on the light, hoping the click of the lamp wouldn’t wake my parents.  If I heard any stirring in my parent’s room next door, I would turn off the light quickly and pretend to be asleep.  Over time, this love of reading turned to a love of writing and creating stories.  I started writing stories on my own and began writing a newsletter to family and friends through email.  The newsletter gave me hours of writing experience that contributed to my ability to not only use English, but to communicate more clearly.  When I got out of high school, I didn’t know what I wanted to be, but I knew I wanted to do something that was of benefit to other people.  After being a missionary, I knew that I loved teaching.  I also remembered the admiration I had for teachers and how much impact I felt they had in my life.  Furthermore, I felt that teaching wouldn’t be a boring office job, because teaching requires constant adaptation and innovation.  My lack of expertise in math, my less than totally enthusiastic feelings towards science, and my lack of confidence in memorizing important details for history (unfounded I see now), and my personal connections to reading and writing led me straight to teaching English.  Furthermore, skills learned through theater and leadership experiences had prepared me to engage students and to work a classroom like I would a crowd.  I had been prepared to make a difference through a life of teaching.

    Of course, you know my current situation.  Despite my personal narrative, I am not going to be teaching next year.  While personal narratives can certainly be empowering, they are in the end a construct that we build to explain our lives rather than a predetermined destiny of some sort.  Let me illustrate this by writing a few more personal narratives that could explain my life.

   1) I grew up in a home that taught and fostered the hard working values of corporate America.  My dad is the Chief Financial Officer in a health system. My mom learned hard work growing up on a farm and managing a sandwich shop in college.  They both have strong leadership abilities and work ethics.  Their life experiences informed how they raised their children.  In the home, I learned leadership, hard work, financial stability, a desire to work through challenges and failure, an ability to work with people towards common goals, punctuality, and accountability to name a few.  I was challenged to think and develop my own ideas and opinions.  I learned how to budget, how to interact with others in meaningful ways, and how to understand the connections in the world around me.  As a child, I enjoyed creative endeavors and was allowed/encouraged to follow my passions.  I also strived to be my best self at school and in the community, knowing that who I became would make a difference.  Throughout my life, I obsessively read books about everything, expanding my knowledge in any way possible.  We discussed the news, political trends, and business trends around the dinner table.  I was encouraged to consider any path I wanted to, and encouraged to try out the ones that I was passionate about.  I was bred not only for success, but also to make a difference.  Throughout my church life and work life, I’ve been afforded opportunities to train others and to understand how organizations work.  Due to all these life experiences and more than I have time to share, I know that I have the skills to act as an entrepreneur or leader in a company.

    2) Despite the fact that my mom and dad are not particular fans of the screen, I grew up loving storytelling that took place in video games and movies.  As a boy I was fascinated by Pixar.  I watched every single behind the scenes features on the DVDs and read everything I could get my hands on. I started teaching myself animation in hopes I could join Pixar’s ranks.  As I got older, I would sometimes go to the movie store (no Redbox or Netflix back then) to rent a movie.  I was content to spend an evening watching a movie by myself, pondering the story and techniques of the film.  My love of such productions was enhanced because I participated in drama and wrote stories myself.  Furthermore, I love creating music and seeing how music and images combine to create meaning.  At school, my favorite subject was English because it was about how we use stories to describe and explain life.  In time, I have realized that people specialize towards one specific part of movie making- but I’m interested in the big picture.  Because I understand a little about animation, a little about lighting, music, storytelling, acting, and so forth, I know that working as a writer/director/producer is my calling.  I know how the pieces connect and can put them together.

    3) The name Tonkinson and the word food are practically synonymous.  If you know a Tonkinson, you likely know how much they love eating yummy food.  There is a picture of little me, in a chef’s hat and apron going to town on some kind of dough, delighted .  Learning to cook foods was an adventure.  As a young child, I learned how to make breakfast, pick and prepare strawberries for jam, peel apples for applesauce, and make grilled cheese sandwiches before soccer games.  As I got older, I was required to make dinner a couple times a month for the family.  When I got together with friends we baked cinnamon rolls, had cooking competitions, and enjoyed food together.  As a family, we enjoyed all sorts of food.  I was encouraged to try everything, and to this day I like nearly all foods and I’m willing to try anything.  The passion for food wasn’t just in my immediate family, but also my extended family.  On my dad’s side, I remember lavish dinners beautifully set out on the table- sweet potato casserole, fish, asparagus, my grandfather always drinking a glass of wine.  And on my mom’s side, we ate food from the farm made with fresh ingredients- cornbread, green beans, sweet corn, berry cobblers, and eggs plucked from beneath the chickens while watching out for snakes.  From my mother, I learned that serving food was an extension of the heart.  If anyone came over, my mom made sure I offered them something to drink and munch on.  Around holidays and birthdays, meals were carefully planned and presented in beautiful dishware.  Cooking was more than just eating, it was about serving others.  This love of food led me to work in restaurants and in catering where my love for food grew deeper.  The year I got married I immersed myself in restaurant business books, looking to fulfill my childhood dream of opening the greatest buffet ever (darn you Bacchanal!).  To this day, one of my favorite things to do at night (and the one my wife likes to tease me about) is to prop up some pillows and read a cookbook until my eyes can no longer stay open.  The studying of cookbooks allows me to invent and modify recipes on the fly because I understand methods, techniques and flavor combinations.  Wonderful food fills our home.  My life has prepared me to make others happy by bring them great food through a restaurant or catering business.

    I can easily think of many other life narratives that could define why I should work in fields like marketing, writing, business consulting, counseling, social work, etc.  But, personal narratives don’t in and of themselves define which path I should take.

    Personal narratives can inspire and help individuals make meaning in their lives.  And we don’t just use narratives to describe our work life, but rather many aspects of our lives.  I believe that our personal narratives can be guided by revelation and directives from the Lord.  However, if we aren’t careful these narratives can be a destructive power in our lives rather than a benefit.  As the Lord expects us to “be anxiously engaged in a good cause and do many things of [our] own free will, and bring to pass much righteousness" I think He would like us to be aware of the narratives that we write for ourselves.  In so doing we can recognize this promise- “For the power is in them, wherein they are agents unto themselves.  And inasmuch as men do good they shall in nowise lose their reward.”

    In Part 2, I’ll explore how the personal narrative can empower or destroy individuals.

The Editor,
Mark