Renowned storyteller to make Woodstock Opera House appearance

WOODSTOCK — Susan O'Halloran recalls riding the L downtown from her very white Southwest Side neighborhood as a young teen in the 1960s, past Chicago blocks where yards and streets were strewn with garbage.

Some adults in her midst would point down and remark about how "those people" lived in filth, and god forbid their kind ever begin to infiltrate their own well-kept neighborhoods.

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In "The Garbage Story," story artist, author and race equity speaker O'Halloran also tells of the day when she, a few of her Catholic school friends and a "modern nun" visited the West Side. What they learned from those who actually lived there — those whose pleas for basic city services like garbage pickup fell on deaf ears — was eye-opening.

O'Halloran, now 76 and an accomplished performer with a National Storytelling Network Circle of Excellence Award and more to her credit, will share stories in the Community Room of the Woodstock Opera House on Sunday, Sept. 20.

"I have the best job possible," O'Halloran wrote. "I actually make my living telling people fables as ancient as the mountains and sharing incidents from my life as recent as what happened to me today. I also gather other people's stories or get them to tell their own."

Her performance will follow the regular 2 p.m. third-Sunday open mic storytelling session that has been a hallmark of Jim May's Storytelling on the Square initiative. O'Halloran is expected to take the mic for 45 to 60 minutes after a short 3 p.m. break, said May, himself an Emmy-winning storyteller and author of several books, including "The Farm on Nippersink Creek" (August House Publishers, 1994), and his most recent, "Trail Guide for a Crooked Heart" (Parkhurst Brothers, 2016).

The free event is sponsored by Illinois Storytelling Inc. O'Halloran's performance will stand as a preview of a "Stories of Peace and Justice" series May and others are planning for 2027 in the Spring Grove Village Park, at the Holocaust Memorial dedicated to Lisa Derman. She was a Holocaust survivor and resistance fighter who died on stage in mid-story at the 2002 Illinois Storytelling Festival.

Storytelling, May said, is uniquely positioned to tackle tough issues. The speakers are not telling others how to think, but instead are relating personal narratives from their own lived experience, or that of others.

"There's an old saying that you can't hate someone if you really know their story," May said.

Added O'Halloran, whose book credits include "Diversity is All Around Us in Our Schools — Isn't it Time We Get it Right?": "I do this because I believe we avoid 'difficult' subjects such as race, class, gender, sexual orientation and physical abilities not because we don't care, but because we don't know how to care ...

"Hearing about people's lives, seeing the world through their eyes helps to make them a part of our family, a brother or sister sometimes or a distant relative at other times, but, at least, never a faceless individual in an overwhelming sea of invisible human faces."

To learn more about the Sept. 20 event, visit woodstockoperahouse.com, or send an email to jimmaystories@gmail.com.

What: Stories of Peace and Justice Prelude

Who: Renowned storyteller Susan O'Halloran

When: 3-4 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 20 (following 2 p.m. open mic)

Where: Woodstock Opera House Community Room, 121 W. Van Buren St.

Cost: No cover; donations accepted

Sponsored by: Illinois Storytelling Inc.