Sex, Lies and Arts&Crafts

Ani Difranco’s True Story of What Was suggests that reality and the stories we tell are two different things; ‘Real is real regardless
Of what you try to say;,  and also that we are no more than a ‘collection of recollections‘. This concept that history is only as accurate as the memory of it, perhaps the chosen memory of it is something that has interested me, and no doubt many others, for years. Whether by history we mean that which we learn in school of the wars and great global changes that have occurred over thousands of years, or we mean the memory of what we did last week, where we went and who said what, memory and our own opinion provides bias.
If two friends argue, and tell another friend their story, that third person will no doubt discover several discrepancies amongst the stories. Even if only one person is present at an event, more often than not stories are edited to make the teller seem better, or provide an excuse, a reason, for a specific action. In many ways, every story we tell is somewhat of a lie, the truth known only to oneself and often not even them. Haven’t you ever told a story, adapted slightly to show yourself in a better light, only to discover that after a number of tellings you can’t quite work out what actually happened? I have a friend who told people he’d been ski-diving so many times, he started to believe it himself, and the line between truth and a lie became blurred. This happens a lot more than people are willing to admit, I know myself that my memory of a  relationship I had at the age of 17 is wrong, because I chose to forget things that hurt me, and also, after telling the story of one particularly painful incident towards the end of the relationship many times, I can’t quite remember the other parts, and I’m almost certain the bits I can I remember wrong.
Lies and secrets fuel our lives, people bond over them, and even secrets about people you’ve never met can be intriguing and interesting, hence why I think it’s a suitable subject for a performance.

1.    Kelly 01.27.12 @ 1:27 am      
   Reply

   Good idea.It would be interesting to see.