I was watching Amadeus the other night. The whole movie is 2 hours and 40 minutes long and the story is told by some guy in a hospital. I was just wondering if anyone in real life tells stories that are more than an hour long. Have you heard any?
I’ve never heard a single story that was that long, outside of a performance, but I have known a number of people who could monopolize a conversation with a series of anecdotes for that amount of time, if allowed. I have connections with academia and the military, both of which seem to attract or produce that type.
The summer I turned 13, I was told a story by a white-haired old man who hung outside the ice cream fountain shop where we would go on hot summer evenings. Now, that summer was a warm one, but not the god-awful warm of a sticky July day in Houston, but rather a pleasant warmth, much like the touch of heat found in the early spring, when you get the first taste of summer. The kind of warmth that makes the couple block walk to the ice cream fountain shop just nice enough to pull off without a long sleeved shirt, but before the sun sets. By the time we had gotten down the road apiece, I had ran a bit ahead of the rest of my family. The unbounded energy of a 13 year old boy running for reasons he will never truly understand. As my mother shouted to me to slow down, I spotted a toad on the side of the road. With thoughts of tormenting my sisters with such a beast coursing through my head, I reached down and scooped up the young toad. Little did I know that the toad’s natural reaction is to release it’s bladder, and I was quickly sprayed with toad urine. I uncupped my hand, and the toad took off into the dusk, where it met with whatever fate awaited it.
By the time we had neared the ice cream fountain shop, I was still ahead of the rest of the family. I was having a hard time deciding if I was going to get a chocolate malted, or a banana split. The chocolate malted was my usual choice, but, given the spring in my step, I was feeling a bit on the wild side. So, just as I was deciding on the banana split, I saw the man sitting outside the shop. He was about 70 years old, with an unlit pipe dangling out of the corner of his mouth. He was dressed in a old, beat up pair of overalls, a denim shirt, and he had an onion on his belt, which was the style at the time. He was staring off into the distance, as if searching for old friends who were due to meet him at any time. He sat on an old wooden rocking chair, one that had clearly seen better days. But rather than rocking, he was steady, still looking off into space.
Well, as I approached, he seemed to come back to himself and looked right at me. The look on his face was one of surprise, which frightened me somewhat. Well, after he had stared awhile, he just gave a low whistle and beckoned me over. These being earlier times, before kidnappings were on the news every night, and with my family just a bit down the road, I went over to the man. I asked him why he was staring so intently at me, and he just chuckled and said: “You remind me of someone I once knew.”
Right about that time, my family caught up and started to enter the shop. My dad asked if I wanted to come in and get some ice cream, and I turned to go. That’s when I saw the crestfallen look on the old man’s face and I told my father I’d be in in a minute. That look carried the weight of long years of lonliness, and it cried out for someone to listen. On that summer night, oh so many years ago, I was just the person to listen to a really long story. And he was just the man to tell one.
So he silently sat back in his chair and began to tell me a story. He started: The summer I turned 13, I was told a story by a white-haired old man who hung outside the ice cream fountain shop where we would go on hot summer evenings. Now, that summer was a warm one, but not the god-awful warm of a sticky July day in Houston, but rather a pleasant warmth, much like the touch of heat found in the early spring, when you get the first taste of summer. The kind of warmth that makes the couple block walk to the ice cream fountain shop just nice enough to pull off without a long sleeved shirt, but before the sun sets. By the time we had gotten down the road apiece, I had ran a bit ahead of the rest of my family. The unbounded energy of a 13 year old boy running for reasons he will never truly understand. As my mother shouted to me to slow down, I spotted a toad on the side of the road. With thoughts of tormenting my sisters with such a beast coursing through my head, I reached down and scooped up the young toad. Little did I know that the toad’s natural reaction is to release it’s bladder, and I was quickly sprayed with toad urine. I uncupped my hand, and the toad took off into the dusk, where it met with whatever fate awaited it. By the time we had neared the ice cream fountain shop, I was still ahead of the rest of the family. I was having a hard time deciding if I was going to get a chocolate malted, or a banana split. The chocolate malted was my usual choice, but, given the spring in my step, I was feeling a bit on the wild side. So, just as I was deciding on the banana split, I saw the man sitting outside the shop. He was about 70 years old, with an unlit pipe dangling out of the corner of his mouth. He was dressed in a old, beat up pair of overalls, a denim shirt, and he had an onion on his belt, which was the style at the time. He was staring off into the distance, as if searching for old friends who were due to meet him at any time. He sat on an old wooden rocking chair, one that had clearly seen better days. But rather than rocking, he was steady, still looking off into space. Well, as I approached, he seemed to come back to himself and looked right at me. The look on his face was one of surprise, which frightened me somewhat. Well, after he had stared awhile, he just gave a low whistle and beckoned me over. These being earlier times, before kidnappings were on the news every night, and with my family just a bit down the road, I went over to the man. I asked him why he was staring so intently at me, and he just chuckled and said: “You remind me of someone I once knew.” Right about that time, my family caught up and started to enter the shop. My dad asked if I wanted to come in and get some ice cream, and I turned to go. That’s when I saw the crestfallen look on the old man’s face and I told my father I’d be in in a minute. That look carried the weight of long years of lonliness, and it cried out for someone to listen. On that summer night, oh so many years ago, I was just the person to listen to a really long story. And he was just the man to tell one.
So he silently sat back in his chair and began to tell me a story. He started: …
The oral tradition is pretty dead in this era of instant gratification and short attention spans…
What were we talking about?
My father-in-law is capable of talking nonstop for as long as it takes one of his thoughts to transpire, and this is v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y. He’ll start out to tell you something, but at every junction, he must tell you the back story to the point he’s trying to make. This can and does often lead him off on another tangent, and more than an hour later, you haven’t heard anything but his voice, and you have absolutely no idea what he was talking about, or whether there was originally a point to his monologue.
I think his son, who has been out in the world and dealt with other people, has been working on getting his dad to edit himself before the words come out. I notice that on the last several visits we’ve made, he isn’t doing it as much anymore. But seriously, everybody who ever spent time with the guy has wondered how he never managed to learn the art of conversation. It’d be different if he could tell amusing or interesting stories, or stories that could at the very least hold your attention, or have a beginning, a middle and an end, but he has none.
I was traveling with a co-worker and she told me her “coming out” story. It was 6 hours in total…including breaks to order pizza and a walk to buy beer.
I was not an interesting tale at all. Some people just don’t know when to shut up (ie take clues you are not really into your distribe)…
I know someone whose single tale can occupy the amount of time his is given. Sometimes, the story is true. :eek:
My grandma tells really long stories. It’s really irritating, though, because she gets totally sidetracked, goes off on long tangents, and sometimes forgets the story altogether! It’s annoying because I like to hear her stories and half the time she never finishes.
She has told me some amazing stories, though. She used to live in Ireland and was a nurse there, and she told me that one time a woman was brought in who had been kept in the attic by her husband for 12 years! My grandma said that what she remembered the most about the lady was how long her fingernails were.
I used to work for a veterinarian that would tell peopl long stories when we were on our lunch break. It wasn’t unusual for him to be talking to some guy for 30 or 45 minutes about some event that had happened to him. I liked listening to his stories though, because he had this ability to make you feel like you were really there as it was happening.
The Chinese classic, Romance of the Three Kingdoms were traditionally oral stories. I think a chapter or two could last an hour.