Here is my quick-o rundown. Stand-up is awesome don’t get me wrong. So is writing. So is improv. So is theater. So is puppetry. It’s all awesome in its own right but storytelling offers the opportunity to get back to why you started doing this all in the first place. Because of deep-seated insecurity. And ALSO because telling a good story is a great talent and people who have that talent often end up on stage doing one thing or another. This storytelling show lets people get back to doing the thing they were originally so good at. No props, no punchlines, nothing but relating to the audience. Done.

Okay, here is an oldie in honor of me working back down in the financial district:

So I was walking down the street by downtown crossing with that unfocussed stare of the city pedestrian. No eye contact. No deliberate looking away. Automaton style. I was raised amongst throngs of people in New Jersey so I am good at this. Sometimes I can even navigate through the streets while reading a book. Now pigeons make decisions all together. When one pigeon says fly they all say fly. So they used their group mind and all took flight as I walked staring at a point beyond them. Much to my surprise, I walked face first into a pigeon just up off the runway. I did what anyone would do, I flung my arms about and yelled, “pthah, blah, pthah, tooh!!” Now no one else had seen me walk into the pigeon. They just saw me walking. And then they saw me freak out. Zero to crazy lady in about ten seconds.

As an add on to this, while eating lunch last week a bee took interest in my food. Bees are small and I am big but bees have a needle on their butt and I do not, so they win. I waved at it casually but it knows about its butt needle and it stuck around. Thousands of times bigger but not ending in points anywhere on my person I now jumped away from this thing no one else knew was there and after jumping away from my food I yelled at it, “Fine! Fine! Take it. You win! I’ll go and you stay here!” Once again, insane.

Jess Sutich has requested a story from other Ciampas. I sent that request along to 6 of them and got two responses: One from my sister Evi that went like this:

yeah, like wearing cast-off cotton men’s boxer briefs. Once.  Big deal.

you little stinker.

This was a reference to a show I wrote, produced and performed 3 years ago.  Part of it was about how my sister Evi enjoyed wearing my sister Elena’s husband’s boxer shorts to bed “every time she went to visit”, according to Elena.   Elena disliked the idea of her sister’s junk being in any way near that of her husband’s.  Needless to day, Evi hated this show.  When I did the show in New York at the PIT, Evi attended and openly heckled me from the audience, saying things like, “That’s not true!”, so the audience would know her side of the story, even though she had not written, produced or directed and rehearsed her side for 6 months.  So that’s Evi’s story.

And another from my sister Sarah that was not nearly as passively angry:

P.S. Its a Girl!!

I like this story.  I think I remember Mandrew. If I remember correctly, his job was to shake the fried chicken thingy at a fast food place. Sarah would tell me his job was to shake chicken. I was happy for her. Also I like how my sisters are not afraid to clog a toilet.

I’ve talked some homeless people in my life, some good conversations, some not.

Here’s the story of the best conversation with a hobo ever.

One night after the bars closed my sister and I were walking to the car.  This really skinny Asian homeless guy with an Asian accent asked us for food. I was delighted at this chance encounter with an outlier in the homeless population.   He was such a unique home-challenged in so many ways: his race, his thick accent, and most of all his puzzling request for food (and not money for booze).

We did not have any food on us, but this was when my sister was way into the Slim Fast craze, and she had a shake in her huge purse. She pulled it out and was like, “I don’t have any food, but I have a Slim Fast, guy, and they’re like TOTALLY filling, ok?”

And Skinny Asian Hobo, with full warrior accent, was like, “Slim Fast? SLIM FAST? Look at me! I don’t need slim fast? I need FAT QUICK!”

And we were like, “Holy fuck, Asian Hobo, that was hilarious.”

And that was the night my sister and I had a pizza party with a very thin Asian homeless man that should have been a writer for Leno.

Love,
Maria

PS. Want to hear more stories about my fascinating life?  Give me a topic in the comments section, and I’ll share away.

TECHNOLOGY!!