While sitting around a fire on a recent adventure, an acquaintance told a "scary story." His four year old daughter was sitting on his lap so I wasn't expecting anything too disturbing. He set his scary scene with a couple of sentences and then said their was on the road a murdered. Wait for it. Potato bug. And then he just stopped. We all laughed for a minute and then I asked who murdered the bug. He seemed a little confused but threw out "ants" as the culprit. And then I realized that no one else cared.
I don't know why I care so much, but I often seem to find myself listening to talks or lectures or just friends and getting annoyed when they just seem to stop in the middle of a story.
There is so much about life that isn't a complete story. I mean when does a person's story end. With their death? with the end of their influence? Most stories are only snippets of bigger stories and I'm ok with those snippets as long as they have a beginning, middle and end.
I'm not a great story teller but I am definitely a consumer of stories and like to think that I am a writer of stories. All the questions don't need to be answered but the main threads need to be tied up.... so why do people seem to end at the middle?
*Yes this is a reference to Paul Harvey.
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