A Little Flutter of Wings and Hearts

The "Cupid" Story Slam at Doyle's Cafe, February 12, 2012
by Owen Grey


I had never seen balloons decorating the speakers on the stage of Doyle’s before but in keeping with the Valentine’s Spirit, I think they made as much sense as anything did that night. We had a great mix of stories and a lot of laughs.

Lynn Holmgren

Cupid has played a bigger and more varied role in people’s lives than I had thought. Lynn Holmgren told us how she tried to open herself back up to love and life through an acupuncturist’s needles instead of Cupid’s arrow. Claudia Dunne told us how seeing Aphrodite and Cupid on TV made her fall in love with Joxer the Mighty and Xenia Warrior Princess. Peter Snoad talked about the love of craft in the theatre and seeing Sir Lawrence Olivier play Hamlet in a performance that left everyone speechless, even Olivier himself could not explain the magic that had happened that night.


Kerri Schmidt told us about Hair Love. When she was in high school, everyone wanted Farrah Fawcett hair and Kerri? She had it. But that styling needed to be refreshed throughout the day. After sneaking off campus and thinking no one was looking, she did a series of “hair flips,” which looked an awful lot like head banging to me. Then she heard everyone else laughing. “Hair love,” she said, “isn’t worth it.”

John Payne

“My mom left my dad and flew to Paris on Valentine’s Day,” John Payne told us. “And the worst part was that she had told us, her kids, and sworn us to secrecy.” John told us about his mother’s adventures and his father’s settled life at home. John and his girlfriend Heidi have moved in with John’s father to take care of him. And now his mother is back. John thinks that it has something to do with Heidi.





Nancy Hanifin spent New Year’s Eve of 1987 up at a ski lodge in Killington. There was supposed to be a big gathering of people but when Nancy and her friends got there, they were the only three in the house. They went out to a bar where the ratio was in their favor: 9 guys for everyone 1 woman, she said. The next day they woke up and one of the other members of the party showed up. The four of them went back to the bar and when they got home, everyone else had shown up. The guy had lost his bed. “Listen, you can sleep on the floor with Mary-Margaret,” Nancy said, “or you can share the bed with me. But, listen, bub, we’re just sleeping.” He chose the bed with Nancy. And that’s how Nancy met her husband.

Betty Pole and David Harney

We had an unprecedented event at the “Cupid” Slam, a team telling. Betty Pole and David Harney told us of the way that Cupid brought them together. Each recounted how they ended up at Pleasure Bay in Boston that day.

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Special guest Domingo Guyton brought his hip-hop and spoken word styles. He showed us a different side of the oral tradition, mixing narrative, rhyme, and word play in a way we don’t normally see at our story slams.

The last piece he did moved me the most.

 

Domingo Guyton

He was raised by his mother alone. His father was out of the picture. As a child, he thought he would never do that to anyone.

He was hanging out with his friend's son, Brandon Jr. They both heard the buzzing of an insect against the window. Brandon Jr. freaked out. When Domingo pulled back the curtain, he found a ladybug.


"Kill it! Kill it!" Brandon Jr. started chanting when he heard it was a ladybug.

“Hold up, dude. A minute ago you were terrified. Now you want me to kill it?”


“What does it matter? It’s just a girl.”


This stopped Domingo in his tracks. He thought about his mom. He thought about all the hearts he’d broken along the way. He realized just how much our culture denigrates women. That’s when he resolved to make a difference.

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Lizi Brown

“I wasn’t planning to get up here,” Lizi Brown told us. “I did it for the free drink.” Lizi told us about the night of an art gallery opening. She wanted to be dressed to the nines for this event; so, her sister had made her a three-piece suit. She was strutting around the room when the woman of her dreams walked in. “Do you know how amazing it felt to be dressed that good when she walked in?” The woman felt the same way that Lizi did and they have been together for 30 years. Lizi’s story won Audience Choice.

Chuck Collins

Have you ever tried to play cupid and bring two of your friends together? Chuck Collins has done it all: setting friends up on blind dates; orchestrating dinners where everyone, except the two people he's hoping to setup, know the real reason for the dinner; and other tricks. When he wanted to introduce Jack and Charlotte he knew nothing he'd tried before would work. Since they were both outdoorsy, he thought a moonlight canoeing outing would be perfect. Jack and Charlotte shared a canoe and fell in love listening to each others' stories. Months later, when they called Chuck and said they had a big announcement, he pictured himself as their best man. "Chuck, we're moving to California," they told him. Chuck learned that sometimes when you play cupid, you bring people together but you lose something yourself. Chuck's story won second place.

Jannelle Codianni

When Jannelle Codianni was 23 years old, she decided she wanted to have an adventure. She moved into her car. Her girlfriend at the time did not approve; so, they broke up. Afraid of getting hit by cupid's arrow again, Jannelle decided to start a no strings attached, physical only relationship with a man. As a lesbian, she figured this was safe. What could go wrong? She started seeing someone in secret. When she realized she might be falling for this tattooed Sicilian man who worked in a gun shop, she broke it off with him. He asked her to make sure she was doing it because it was what she wanted to do not because it was what she thought she should do. But she had been hit by cupid's arrow and ended up getting back together with him and then quickly moving in with him. In order to assert her freedom, she insisted on doing everything around the house. "One day he said, 'We need to talk,'" Jannelle told us. "He sat me down on the couch and said, 'Look, I knew who you were when this thing started. No one is trying to take your masculinity away.' And, guys, that takes a lot of security for a man to say." Jannelle has since married him and they now have a son together. Jannelle's story won first place.

Special Guest Domingo Guyton; Chuck Collins (2nd Place); Jannelle Codianni (1st Place); Lizi Brown (Audience Choice); and Host Robin Maxfield

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Thanks, as always, to our judges. Thanks to Violet Maxfield for providing our intermission entertainment. Thanks to Paula Junn for the great photos.

Special thanks to Steve Garfield for live streaming the "Cupid" Story Slam. Check out Steve's monthly technology meetup Boston Media Makers. Their next meeting is Sunday, March 4th at Doyle's Cafe in Jamaica Plain.

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Semi-Finals Are Here!


Semi-Finals at Doyle's, Sunday, March 11 at 6:30pm.

Semi-Finals at Johnny D's, Tuesday, March 14 at 6:30pm

Semi-Finals at Club Passim, Monday, March 19 at 6:30pm


These events sell-out! So, get your tickets now!

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Owen Grey has been telling stories all his life. He has found his home with massmouth and the greater Boston storytelling scene.

Come see him compete at the Semi-Finals at Doyle's, Sunday, March 11 at 6:30pm. 

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Corrections: In an earlier version of this blog post, I had spelled Jannelle's name wrong. The blog now has the correct spelling.