♪ MAX GARC ÍA CONOVER: I didn't think about it for years, not until middle school, when, disastrously, I fell in love with a girl in my class.

MICAELA BLEI: I decided I've got to do something.

I've got to go on an adventure and get out of here and make myself beautiful.

AMANDA GOODWIN: And then she let me wrap my arms around her, and, like, knowing exactly, somehow, how much I could handle, she just sat by me and let me get it all out.

THERESA OKOKON: Tonight's theme is "Love Calls."

♪ ANNOUNCER: This program is made possible in part by contributions from viewers like you-- thank you.

OKOKON: One of the most frustrating things about love is that it can happen when you least expect it.

Sparks can suddenly fly when two people meet unexpectedly.

But really, sometimes it's more than just sparks and a little romance that we're seeking.

We want life to be filled with passion.

We want everything to feel like it's a true calling.

♪ BLEI: I'm Micaela Blei.

I am a storyteller living in Brooklyn, New York.

I teach storytelling and I also research it.

Last year, I got my doctorate in education, and my, my dissertation research was about storytelling and teacher identity.

OKOKON: So what is it about storytelling that keeps you engaged?

BLEI: Storytelling is such a flexible form.

If you need to tell a story to heal, there is a way to do that.

And if you need to tell a story to be hilarious, there is a way to do that, as well.

OKOKON: So what's the most challenging part for you to tell the story that you're going to share tonight?

BLEI: For me, the most challenging part of telling this story is not remembering what to say, or even how the audience...

I have a lot of faith in the audience.

I think it's about my own emotional reaction to it and, um...

Shoot.

OKOKON: Keep going.

BLEI (tearfully): This is an unexpected reaction.

I would estimate that I've told this story 300 times, and it still can sometimes surprise me that I'm... that I'm trusting people with my vulnerability and that people are holding it with me.

When I tell a vulnerable story, I'm not...

I'm not ever asking anyone to take care of me.

I'm only telling stories that I know I've processed, and all of that, but it can be very, um, powerful, and sometimes when you're going back to a time that you didn't feel great, even if it's in a hilarious context, even if you're in complete control of that story, it can... it can really take you by surprise.

I'm 25 years old.

I'm teaching third grade, and I love teaching third grade.

I basically have an eight-year- old's sense of humor, so it really works out.

(laughter) The problem is, at this time, nothing else is really happening in my life.

My friends are all falling in love around me.

I'm terrified of online dating, which was new at the time, and I also happen to feel like I'm the ugliest one of my friends.

They've spoken to me about it, but I hadn't been convinced.

And it finally got so bad that I decided I've got to do something.

I've got to go on an adventure and get out of here and make myself beautiful, I guess.

And someone told me about these volunteer work adventures where, you know, you just pay airfare and then you get to go and work somewhere for free, and they pay your room and board.

And so I go online and I'm deciding between two trips.

And the first trip is volunteering at an arts festival in Calabria, Italy.

The second one is being a tour guide in a troll village in Iceland.

(laughter) And I wish I was here to tell you a story about a troll village in Iceland.

(audience members cheer) Unfortunately, I am not, because which one's going to make me beautiful?

It's Calabria, right?

I mean, I can see it-- it's sunny, there's an olive tree, I'm working on a mosaic.

There's, like, an Italian painter who gives me pasta or something-- I don't know, I didn't really think that part through-- and he kisses me.

And I'm tan in this fantasy, which I am not in this reality, and I decide this is what's going to happen.

And so I go, and right away, it starts to happen like I thought.

It's sunny, and there are olive trees, and there is even an artist.

One of the other volunteers is this sculptor named Milen.

He's French.

He has long hair, which I find amazing, and he also very rarely wears a shirt.

(laughter) And... he doesn't speak very great English, but I took A.P.

French for three years, so I'm, like, "This is going to work out."

So... so, the first night, we're supposed to serve food at this festival, and we're all given t-shirts for the festival, and there's this other volunteer who's also there.

Her name is Jordina.

Jordina is gorgeous.

She looks like she's made out of olive oil and sex.

(laughter) Right?

And she's taken her t-shirt, and you know how when you make a scoop neck out of your t-shirt?

She's cut her t-shirt down, but she's also cut it up.

There's basically a strip of fabric on her; she looks amazing.

And Milen comes up to me and says, "You know, I could fix your shirt for you if you want."

And I'm, like, "Okay," you know?

And so he cuts it while it's on me with a knife.

And when I look down, I do not look like olive oil and sex, you guys.

(laughter) I look like cookie dough.

But it's okay, I laugh, but I go and change as soon as possible, and I know that the next day, it's going to be all right, because the next day is kids' day.

And this is where kids from all over the villages and towns are going come and do art.

This is what I can do, right?

This is my jam, and this is going to really impress Milen, also.

So the next day, huge canvas, paints everywhere, and I'm sort of waiting to see what happens.

I don't speak any Italian.

But this little kid comes over next to me, maybe five years old, a black bowl cut, and he sort of sits down near me and draws a circle on the canvas.

And I reach over and I draw cat ears on the circle.

And he looks at me, like... (approvingly): "Okay."

And he goes, "Bruno."

And I go, "Micaela."

So we start drawing cats and having a good time.

And later, Milen comes up to me and says, "You know, you're very good with children."

And I'm, like, "Thank you."

And he says, "When I get back to France, I want to teach sculpture to autistic children."

And I'm, like, it's not enough that he never wears a shirt... (laughter) And I say, "You know, that's so interesting.

"Have you ever read the book, "A Curious Incident of the Dog in Night-Time?

It's about autism."

And he says, "No, but in my bag right now in French, I have The Strange Happening of the Dog at Midnight."

(laughter) And I'm, like, "That's the same book.

Your English is not great."

And he says, and he says, "You know, if you want, you can borrow it and you can practice your French."

And I think this is a very good idea, because when we have children, I want them to speak English and French.

This is practical, I'm going to speak French to them.

It keeps going on and on like this, and our conversations get deeper and we get closer.

And finally, it's the last night, and we're standing outside and there is moonlight.

And we are talking and he's... and he's looking at my mouth.

And my friends had told me-- this is good information for you if you want it-- my friends had told me that when a guy looks at your mouth, it means he wants to kiss you.

I'm, like, okay, so I lean forward.

He says, "I care about you so much."

And I'm, like, "Me, too."

And he says, "I just wish you were more attractive."

(audience gasps) Can I say I wish you had all been behind me when this happened?

(laughter) This is how I found out this whole time he'd been sleeping with Jordina, the olive oil girl.

(audience member groans) And on the way home, on the night train from Calabria, I got robbed, and I lost everything, including my camera.

And I'm sitting on this train thinking, "I'm glad I lost my camera."

I don't want to see pictures of what I looked like on this trip.

Which is why, when I got home, I decided Italy didn't make me beautiful.

I'm going to make myself beautiful.

So four days later, I'm sitting in the chair at a plastic surgeon's office.

And I'm going to fix my nose, and I tell him this.

And he says, "Oh, your nose is not the problem."

And I think he's going to say, "Your self-confidence is the problem," which is what they always say.

He says, "No, your chin is the problem."

(audience groans and laughs) "If you just got a chin augmentation, it would really balance out your face."

And I go home and I look in the mirror, and I'm, like, "He's right."

And so's Milen.

And I make the appointment.

And that's when I get a package in the mail.

And it's a CD from one of the other volunteers, this American named Jack.

There's a note in it, and it says, "I heard you lost all your stuff, and here are all the photographs that I took on this trip."

This is before selfies, so the ones I lost, I wasn't in a lot of those photos.

But I know I'm going to be in these photos.

And I'm scrolling through, and I'm, like, "Confirmed-- ugly, ugly, ugly."

And then I finally get to one photo, and I didn't know it was being taken.

And it was from kids' day.

And it's me and that little kid Bruno.

And we're at the canvas, and I've got paint on my face, and I'm cracking up, and so is he.

And I look so happy.

I look like I'm in the exact place I want to be, and I have to admit, I look beautiful.

Thank you.

(cheers and applause) Thank you.

♪ CONOVER: My name is Max García Conover.

I'm a songwriter and a teacher, and I live up in Bath, Maine.

OKOKON: And can you tell me about what types of songs you like to write?

CONOVER: I write sort of story-driven folk songs, mostly with a guitar and vocal.

OKOKON: What's the process of writing a story like for you?

CONOVER: Since the beginning of writing song... writing and singing songs for me, telling stories in between songs has been part of it.

The process of that was just walking around before the show and mapping out the sets and knowing sort of what kind of little stories I was going to tell in between.

And then I would work the stories out on stage.

This is the first story that I've made into a story that's supposed to stand on its own, and not be an introduction to a song.

OKOKON: Do you feel the same sort of anticipation going up on stage?

CONOVER: Not really, no.

Because I've been singing songs for a long time, and I really look forward to being on stage.

And I get nervous for shows, but I, I know that when I get on stage, I'll have these things that I can count on, like my guitar, and the microphone.

And stories...

I've only told stories a few times before with just the story, without my guitar, and so it's a different kind of nervousness.

It's a much more visceral nervousness.

When I was six years old, my family moved to a small town in western New York.

Our house was just down the street from the local church.

And so every Sunday, we watched as the entire town showed up there.

And then eventually, we started going, too, which I was mostly happy about.

The only thing I didn't like about church was that, halfway through every service, all the kids had to go downstairs for Sunday school.

I didn't know any of the other kids, and this is sort of the first time I can remember where I felt like I was in a place that I didn't belong.

And so when the Sunday school teacher quit and my mom volunteered to replace her, I was thrilled.

And also surprised.

My mom is a labor lawyer from a Puerto Rican family in the Bronx, and she didn't look or behave like any of the other moms at church.

But the first week where she was the Sunday school teacher was awesome.

She was fun and cool, and I felt like the luckiest kid there.

And then the next week, she got fired.

(audience murmuring) And when she asked why, the youth pastor told her that she gave the wrong answer to a question.

A kid had asked, "Where does God live?"

And she answered, "God lives everywhere.

God's in the walls and in the air, and in you-- everywhere."

The youth pastor told her, "This is a Methodist church.

"We don't believe God lives everywhere.

You should've said that he lives in the sky."

(laughter) After we got home that day, I felt like my mom and I had both failed in some unclear but important way.

(laughter) And when she noticed how disappointed I was, she suggested that we start our own Sunday school, just the two of us down in the woods behind our house.

And so that's what we did.

The next Sunday, she woke me up early, and instead of walking toward the church, we walked in the other direction, past the barn and through the field, where the grass got taller and taller, and then turned to sumac.

And we picked our way through rose thorns and stumbled through spiderwebs until we got down to where the underbrush opened up and the trees towered.

And we kept walking softly and carefully, all the way down through to the creek.

And at the creek, we sat and we prayed, which, to my mom, meant reading Mary Oliver poems and naming the birds.

(audience chuckling) And so we did that every Sunday.

And we stopped going to that church down the street.

And I stopped thinking about that church down the street.

I didn't think about it for years, not until middle school, when, suddenly and disastrously, I fell in love with a girl in my class.

She and I had been going to school together since we were little kids, but we never really interacted there.

But I knew that she sometimes went to that church.

So every Sunday, I started walking over.

I had this idea that if we ran into each other outside of school, we might sort of strike up a conversation.

And we did run into each other, but we never, ever spoke to each other.

I was too quiet and too shy.

And this went on for weeks and weeks and weeks, until finally, I had my first little breakthrough not at church, but in English class, when I wrote a short story.

And then she sent me a message on AOL Instant Messenger to tell me that she liked it.

(audience chuckling) So I wrote another one, and then another, and then, like, 12 more, and I sent them all to her on AOL Instant Messenger.

We started talking a lot on there, and she liked to write stories, too, and poems, or she'd be drawing or painting.

She was always making things, and she seemed to understand art and beauty in a way that I had no idea anybody could.

She was teeming with her love for those things.

She was far away and right down the street.

And then, one day, miraculously, she was at my house, and it was just the two of us.

And, as always, I couldn't think of anything to say.

So I asked if she wanted to go for a walk down through the woods.

It was late spring in western New York, when everything is green and lush.

And we walked that same path that my mom and I had taken so many times, past the barn and through the woods, all the way down to the creek, and it was there, at the creek, where she turned to me and she looked at me and she told me that she always felt super-awkward around me, and she was sorry, but she only wanted to be friends.

(audience groans) And so just like that, without ever getting to date this girl that I was in love with, I got dumped.

(laughter) But if I were to call that the end of the story, I think that would be like telling you that God lives up in the sky.

(laughter) A few years later, when she and I were both juniors in high school, we got cast as husband and wife in the school play.

(laughter) We were Mr. and Mrs. Keller in the very seriously drama The Miracle Worker.

And all of a sudden, I didn't have to think of anything to say to her anymore; it was all just written out for me on a page.

(laughter) And I don't know if that's why, but in between scenes, we found we could talk really easily, and joke easily.

In the play, I was supposed to be Helen Keller's father, this stern, sad Southern man, and I really wanted to do a good job.

But at rehearsal, all I thought about was talking with her and laughing with her.

I wasn't trying to win her over anymore, and I wasn't in love with some idea I had of her.

What I loved was talking with her and laughing with her.

There was this one moment where she and I were both laughing so hard, we were crying, and then the lights came up and the scene started, and I had to slam my fist on the dining room table and shout... (in slight Irish accent): "Damn it, Katie, she can't see."

(laughter) That's the Southern accent that I prepared for the role.

(laughter) And so the play was not good.

(laughter) By the end of it, she and I were headed out on our first date.

(audience member cheers) We went to Applebee's.

(laughter) It was early winter in western New York, when everything is gray.

The slush on the ground was gray, and the strip mall was gray, and the sky was low and gray.

And to me, on that night, it all felt endless.

And it seemed entirely possible that God lives everywhere.

(cheers and applause) ♪ GOODWIN: My name is Amanda Goodwin.

I'm a writer, I'm a storyteller, and I've dedicated my career to helping area nonprofits tell their stories about why what they do is so important and try to help raise funds and awareness for them.

OKOKON: So, how have you evolved as a storyteller?

GOODWIN: The way that I'm always evolving as a storyteller is the same way as a story evolves.

It's reflecting on the details and the memory and then letting the meaning actually reveal itself.

OKOKON: And I understand that you teach storytelling to others, as well.

So, do you feel like storytelling is ultimately a universal art form?

GOODWIN: I think that we put storytelling literally on a stage, right?

And it's, like, high art form that you have to do, and you have to prep, and you have to think about, but, like, that's not where it starts.

It starts at your hair salon.

It starts in your classroom.

It starts on a run with a friend.

You know, you are telling stories to people in line and standing next to you all of the time.

And if you could give yourself enough credit to say, like, "Oh, I'm already engaging in this art, I can just take it one more step," then you can get to the stage.

Anyone can!

Anyone can.

♪ I'm 22, and for the third night in a row, on all fours, cleaning up dog diarrhea off the otherwise pristine kitchen tile.

And it is not confined to the kitchen, and I do not have gloves.

This is what I get for lying.

I am not a homeowner.

I am not a dog owner.

Technically speaking, I'm homeless, which kind of comes as a shock, because I've just recently graduated top of my class from a pretty reputable four-year university.

I've even managed to land a full-time job with a salary and benefits at a National Public Radio member station.

A week ago, I thought I was loaded, and I pretty much was.

On tequila.

On my couch, in my apartment, with my boyfriend from Georgia, who I'd given both my V card and my debit card to.

And while Georgia boy was my one and only, I'd also just recently found out there had been dozens of others for him during our time together, one of whom was now calling his mom and claiming to be pregnant with his child.

And another whom I had the pleasure of walking in on in her birthday suit, sprawled out on the bed that my parents had bought for me.

My exit from our apartment was swift and complete.

Fortunately, there were friends and colleagues who offered me a couch to crash on.

Fortunately, there was the family that I had nannied for all through college who said I could stay there as long as I needed, which, that summer, ended up being about three weeks, because that's when they started asking friends if anyone needed a house sitter.

Turns out there was a neighbor who did.

I mean, gorgeous four-bedroom home.

I put on my best pair of flip-flops to talk to these people, made sure to do all of the smiling, mention my NPR employment.

They drove Subarus and wore Birkenstocks.

(laughter) I knew from the opening conversation in the driveway that they were going to hand over the keys, and that's when we went inside, and I noticed the silver bowls on the kitchen floor.

They belonged to Diva, who, as far as I could tell, Diva was a four-legged, short-haired brown monster, which I quickly learned was called a boxer.

"Oh, I can't believe we haven't talked about Diva yet.

"Oh, she's such a lovey.

"You are going to love her.

"I mean, you love dogs, right?

You love them?"

I forced myself to keep smiling and pet Diva's head.

And then I tried to give her this message without ever saying it out loud.

(softly): "Please don't out me.

"I need this so badly.

Also, please don't kill me."

The truth was, I was terrified of dogs.

I mean, terrified of dogs.

I'd been bitten twice as a kid, seen my parents attacked.

Plus, they smelled and slobbered and needed all of the things.

But I had nowhere else to go, and these people were going to be out of this dope pad for a month, and they were also going to offer to pay me $50 a day to live there.

I mean, that was going to double my bank account.

(laughter) For whatever reason, they bought it, and Diva's parents let me move in.

And that first night I showed up after work, I was welcomed to her mess.

I called Diva a bad dog.

I put her out in the yard, and I proceeded to bleach and scrub and clean.

And when I let her back in, I told her she could have the master and then I locked myself up in one of the rooms that I assumed used to belong to a kid.

The next morning, I woke up, I said hello to Diva, I let her back out in the yard again, I gave her food, I went to work.

I came back to a mess.

Again I put her out in the yard, I scrubbed, I cleaned.

Again I locked myself up in that room.

By the third night and the third mess, I didn't even have the energy to put Diva out in the yard.

Instead, I just put her in the three-season porch off the side to the kitchen, and as I scrubbed and I cleaned and I bleached, I also started to swear, and cry.

And Diva started pawing at the glass.

And I really want to tell you that I walked over and let her in, but I didn't.

I just proceeded to cry and scrub and clean and bleach, and I finished the kitchen.

And then I moved on to the living room, and I did more crying and more scrubbing and more bleaching.

And I don't care what chemicals you use, but that smell doesn't really go away.

So then I started opening all of the windows, and then I started opening all the doors, and the last door I opened was that sliding door to the three-season porch.

And when I let Diva back in, she started doing this figure- eight thing through my legs.

And she didn't stop until I gave in and sat down on that floor that I had just cleaned again, and she just let me cry.

And then she let me lean into her, and then she let me wrap my arms around her, and, like, knowing exactly, somehow, how much I could handle, she never actually leaned back or licked me or did any of that.

She just sat by me and let me get it all out.

And once it was finally all out, I reassured her that her family would return and that I would get better.

(laughter) And then we started again, and went into the living room and watched Sex and the City.

(laughter) That night, I left the door open to the room that I slept in and Diva slept in the hallway.

The next morning, Diva and I went on our first official walk together.

That afternoon, I cut out of work at lunch for a frisbee toss.

That night, there was no mess, far more Sex and the City, and a Diva at the foot of my bed.

Toward the end of the month, I was asking the radio station's policy on bringing the dog to work.

(laughter) And Diva and I had both moved into the master and each taken up our respective sides on that ample, yummy king bed.

(laughter) When Diva's family returned, she was thrilled to see them.

But when she said goodbye to me, she did that familiar figure- eight thing through my legs, and this time I willfully and quickly dropped to my knees, and she slobbered me good.

And I loved every sticky, icky bit of it.

(laughter) Diva healed my heart when I thought it was supposed to stay broken, and she turned my fear of four-legged monsters into an unconditional and everlasting love that I will carry with me for the rest of my life.

Thank you.

(cheers and applause) ANNOUNCER: This program is made possible in part by contributions from viewers like you-- thank you.

♪