Richard was an unhappy parole officer who hated his job. Through the persistent nudging of his friend Christine, he began attending a local storytelling club. Though initially just listening, he eventually was convinced to tell a story himself. This sparked something in Richard and helped him realize his unhappiness. He quit his job, burned his uniform, and embarked on a new path as a blacksmith. Storytelling and working with fire have helped transform Richard's life and outlook. He now finds great fulfillment and happiness in his work.

1. Hammer of the Gods:
Finding Self through Fire, Flame and the Storytelling Way
There are too many adjectives I could use to describe the trip I took to the Irish and English lands
the summer of 2015. I met so many people. Learned so many stories and had a bit of trauma
along the way. This is the start of maybe many short fictionalized pieces that are based on
ethnographic ramblings, interviews, and conversations. There are bits that are based solely on
interviews and what happened as seen through the lens of my workings Part II us the only
section that has not been fictionalized. The rest has been fictionalized, taking real events and
expanding on them. The story of Richard is remarkable because he took the spark some of us feel
and ran with it until he was where he wanted to be. Many of us are unhappy in life but do not
make the change needed to be free and happy. It may be out of fear, lack of motivation or life
pressures that keeps us where we are and it is hard to make a drastic life change. Richard, as you
will find out, made that change. He was so unhappy with where his life had taken him, he
jumped the tracks, tucked and rolled and hoped for a safe landing. So far, he seems to have made
that safe landing and appears to be very happy with his life. I think it is important to note he had
a catalyst in his life. Someone was there to nudge him to look at something new. Stories,
storytelling and narrative hold power over us or it would have gone the way of the dodo. There
are many answers to questions I ask of my informants, many of the answers ring similar to each
other…except for that one time, one informant told me that a question was daft. Sometimes
change is nice. Yet, for all of these people, there is a driving force to tell stories. Richard is no
exception, an introverted man with no desire to be in front of people now tells stories regularly.

2. Yet his own story continues to inspire those that he knows and now it will reach out to those that
he has yet to meet.
Part I
The Blacksmith
Clang…Clang….Clang…Richard struck the metal with the hammer. It was hot, really hot. He
didn’t expect it to be this hot, he wasn’t sure what he was expecting, being a blacksmith was hot
and hard work. Clang…Clang…Clang…he hit the metal again thinking about how soon it would
look less like a blob and more like a sword. The sword reminded himself, before he went into the
fire, he was miserable and unhappy with his life, and he never thought he would be in this
position. He was happy, it was weird, but great somehow.
Part II
A Moment in Interviews
I met Richard in July of 2015, Richard Hemingway, friend of another storyteller known for her
stories through Hebden Bridge, UK and her legendary nagging. This friend, Christine, was very
insistent that I meet as many tellers as possible, including Richard. She, in her, lyrical northern
England accent told me that “I think you will really get on with Richard.” So one day, she drove
me over to Richards place, a bi-level split building with a single room flat in the top level and a
blacksmith’s work area and fire in the bottom level. Richard is a really reserved guy, he says “He
finds it (storytelling) to do and since he finds it hard to do he forces himself to do it.” He was
dressed somewhere in between very casual and somewhat business like, with a vest and an
untucked button up shirt. Richard is an avid smoker, the smell of tobacco hung in the air of his
flat. As I watched him, I noticed the lines that graced his face, from smiles, laughter and most

3. likely cringing from having to listen to another Celtic myth. I asked Richard his story, I wanted
to know what storytelling had done to change him and his life. He said “it’s changed a hell of a
lot of things, actually…”
Richard worked with Christine, he was the equivalent of a parole office for young offenders.
Both Christine and Richard said that he was miserable and hated where his life was going…. he
even burned his uniform. He never thought that stories were for him, he always believed that
they were kid’s things, something you read. The weathered blacksmith said that he never really
understood how important they were. As time went on and Christine nudged him to come to the
storytelling club and tell stories, he slowly realized that these stories have cultural and personal
importance. It was storytelling that helped him realize that he could do anything and it didn’t
have to be what society said was acceptable.
Part III
Visions of the Past
Clang…Clang…Clang went the hammer, poof poof poof went the steam. Though he had learned
the basics, Richard was working on honing this craft and thinking about what changed his life so
completely. Sweat rolled down his brow, like Jack and Jill after they went up the hill, but he
wiped away Jack and Jill so he could keep working. Clang…
He remembered so vividly….Working as a police officer, he remembered how much sass and
regret he had for what he was doing. Supposedly he was to be helping kids, instead he was
checking off boxes on a piece of paper, fucking bureaucracy, he thought to himself. This in’t
doing any good for anybody, including me.

4. Clang…
Oh those memories, everybody knew how miserable I was. I mean, how could they not, I shot
off at the boss, I was always arguing with someone about something. It’s weird, y’know…
Richard continued to talk to himself…If I hadn’t given into Christine I would probably still be
there….hating me life.
Part IV
A Storyteller Changes Everything
Knock Knock Knock… That brought Richard out of his day dream, he set the practice sword
down and went to open the door. Speak of the devil, it was Christine. She’d apparently come to
pick up the fireplace set he made her. She was really excited, these pieces had rams heads on the
top with horns twisting down, great time and effort was put into this piece, and he really owed
her a lot.
Christine came in for a hug, they embraced for a couple of seconds and then came the questions.
So Richard she said in that lyrical, delicate voice, “what are you making?” “Ah nothin’ special”
he said, “just practicing on my sword makin” “Here’s your fireplace set, I hope you like it,” he
said with a smile. Christine was excited about her new set, “Oh, Richard, its lovely,
really really lovely, thank you!!” She opens her handbag, looking for something, likely it was
money. “Here you go dear, 160 quid.” With that, he thanks her and she has to run, she is on her
way to work and couldn’t stay too much longer.
He goes back to the fire, feeling the heat on his face putting him almost in a trance remembering
that random American that asked a million questions. It got him to thinking about stories and the

5. changes he made in his life. It felt like he stood on the fire, metaphorically speaking and the fire
were the stories that opened his eyes to a whole different way of seeing. Richard doesn’t deny
that there are different people, more specifically clever people and stupid people, but they are
still people. He realized how similar people really are, stories, he said, stories bring people
together, there is some kind of unconsciousness that binds people together – No matter how
clever they may be or may not be.
All of those questions, they made him think. As he looked into the forge, he could feel the heat,
the flame was hypnotic. It washed over him, a heat-wave and he felt that familiar feeling, the one
he felt when he left his job and burn all of the things that reminded him of that life. It was
freeing, like there was an incarnation of light that rose in his chest, almost forcing out a smile of
a stoic man. He continued to stare, thinking about what a curmudgeon he had become and how
he thought he hated people.
A vision fell over him, a vision of the past. There she was, Christine, trying to convince him that
storytelling has practical purposes. He just grumbled, checking boxes, he hated boxes on
paper…he hated paper he had to write on. That Christine, he thought, “She is persistent, I will
give her that.” What he hadn’t realized is that she would be a catalyst over time, a catalyst that
would help him realize the unhappiness he was living with.
Like, one of them angels, come to reroute your life…heh, Christine, an angel. Richard laughed to
himself, still looking into the fire. Slowly he came out of the trance, wondering if this was how
Odin felt when he used his gifts to look through time and space.

6. He pulled out the armor he’d been working on, a local theatre group commissioned him to make
for a show of theirs. Once everything was ready he stared beating the metal into submission or
maybe it was more of creating a working relationship. As a rhythm pounded out on the metal, the
heat took him away. This process, brought out instincts, feelings and abilities that had long lay
dormant. Sometimes he swore he could see the future. Today however, he was seeing the past,
reliving those movements that lead him to this point – him beating a piece of metal, over a fire to
make it fit his needs.
Clang…Clang…Clang
Part V
A Moment Changes Everything
Storytelling and fire, two elements that had changed Richard’s life. Christine did nag him – she
would tell you herself if you asked. Richard finally gave in, figuring if he gave it a go, she would
leave him alone. He went to the club, the storytelling club where a bunch of British people get
together and tell stories. The stories here run the gamut of types of stories that people come up
with. Many will tell stories of Celtic mythology and fairytales, Richard would rather throw
himself into the forge than listen to another Celtic myth. He says they’re overdone and poorly
done, most of the time. He wishes that more people would embrace Nordic stories, they have so
much more action and energy.
Tonight Christine is the MC and she starts with a traditional story which he instantly falls into a
trance, envisioning every scene, every character. It was at this moment he realized something

7. had been missing in his life. There was a spark one he had been missing, but he felt it again. The
night went on, so many storytellers, different stories, different forms. George had his
monologues, Ursula her acting background lent to more physical movement and theatrical
stories. The list went on, but something had finally clicked.
Richard kept going to the club but continued to only watch. Christine pushed him toward telling
stories. This, however, struck fear into his heart. Richard being a reserved person, a true introvert
who had never pushed his limits, never thought he’d be on a stage.
Time passed, again Christine’s gentle and persistent nudging won and he found himself on the
stage telling a story. He kept it deadpan – not a lot of movement and it wasn’t of Celtic descent.
This was it, this is what he would do, well mostly, maybe, sometimes. He couldn’t live off of
nothing though, he’d have to keep working.
Clang…Clang…Clang…
What time is it? Wiping away the sweat he looked at the clock, he had worked half the day away
without a cigarette. Richard put down his tools and headed outside, as he looked out the window
he saw the usual northern England weather….rain. He didn’t mind, as long as he could light up.
He went back to the door where he had left his pack of cigarettes, minding the incredible piles of
steel, random bits of metal and the projects he had practiced on. It was a maze, but this maze was
all his. Someday he would like to get this all sorted, not all of was his, well it was now because
he bought it, but some things belonged to the previous blacksmith that owned this building.
Remembering what he was looking for, he got the fags (cigarettes) and lit up inside. He quickly
walked out as to not stink up the place. It was another grey and rainy day, almost a week’s worth

8. of rain. He surveyed the random things in his garden/yard and thought of all the projects he had
to keep him busy for the next 100 years. Richard took one last drag of the cigarette, put it out on
the metal ashtray he had fashioned. He then went back in to the room with the forge, it was a
perfect day for blacksmithing…