This is a story I told at a Moth-like storytelling event here in Seattle called "A Guide to Visitors". It's from a few years ago, but I'm really proud of it.
Thank you for the praise. I very much enjoy a well-told story, and I love crafting them as well. As for the women... I believe the men were mostly off at work. There's no work in this town, so the men get up early, travel far to work, and come home late. I simply wasn't there to see them. The Balkan Wars did cost a lot of lives, but nowhere in my travels throughout the region did I find an obvious population imbalance between men and women, that could be attributed to the men dying in war. I choose to think the men of Murino were simply away at work...
this was amazing. thank you for sharing it!!
This is an AMAZING story, it's well told. Sad, lovely stuff. Hard to top that, but if there is a story you'd like to share with Hubski, feel free to. I'm sure the world of debt-collection is full of adventure. How did the musical go? The Grimaldi's?
Thanks, TNG. I have a bunch of stories from my life that I need to get assembled and published. Most are just words, but I have built a couple into stories I can present live on stage like this... As far as debt collection goes... I was the guy that designed the software. But I did go door-knocking in Poland with one of our debt collectors to get a feel for what it was like on the ground. And it isn't what you think. A debt collector in Eastern Europe is usually a retired pensioner, trying to make a couple of extra bucks. A 70-year old man in a suit is not someone the debtor feels threatened by... they are more likely to pity them. So it immediately de-escalates the potential stress/antagonistic nature of a debt collector's call, and turns into the debtor wanting to help the little old man out. And The Grimaldi's was brilliant. Ran for a month at Hale's Palladium here in Seattle. I got to be a (dead) Olde Tyme Circus Barker, and work with the twin aerialists. (I have a bit of circus background, so aerial rigging is something I can run.) The story is told well in the Indiegogo campaign here.