There is something utterly magical about a good story, well told. In a way this leads on from my love of fiction that I spoke of a couple of days ago. People with the skills needed to tell a story should be considered a treasured resource.

Mum, Dad and I have been to the Eden Project today. I’m sure that most Brits at least know of it, even if they’ve not been there so please do forgive me a description for those who have not heard of it. The Eden Project is sort of like many fairy tales. You can’t see it. You can’t smell it. You can’t hear it or touch it or even taste it until you tumble over the edge of a hillside into a huge hole and then you see this strange green and fertile land full of giant alien spawn. The hole is a disused china clay pit and the alien spawn is the biomes. Anyone who has seen “Die Another Day” will have seen the Eden Project’s alien spawn biomes. They are sort of huge bubbly greenhouses on a scale it’s hard to imagine, one of the biomes is “the biggest tropical rainforest in captivity” and the other is a temperate, Mediterranean biome full of citrus trees, herbs, olives and vines.

Last time I took my folks there it wasn’t the biggest success ever, with my Dad coming over all funny in the tropical biome and having to leave suddenly. I needed to go back for a Uni project and so persuaded them to come back with me for another look. It was a much better experience, possibly because an early spring day was a lot less oppressive in the biomes than the summer day of our last visit.

One of the things they do is to put on storytelling in the Mediterranean biome a couple of times a day and so we sat and watched the “Joseph lady” do her stuff in front of a motley collection of pensioners, young families, assorted odd-bods and stragglers and a big-ish complement of school children, sat cross-legged and attentive on the floor. Joseph lady was wearing a wonderful “coat of many colours” made, as I hope this photo adequately shows, a coat made entirely of old ties. I must say it was better than impressive. But then better than impressive was also a phrase that could be used about Joseph lady herself. She had a delightful charisma and charmed everyone in her audience absolutely – even “cynical old me” was doing “arctic hare” ears every time she said the words. It was a very congenial way of whiling away a few minutes.

BUT what a job. Can you imagine any job better than sitting on that utterly beautiful wooden throne in the middle of a citrus grove, in the depths of alien spawn in a gigantic pit in the depths of Cornwall? Consider the alternative ways to make a living then tell me that the job of the Eden Project’s storyteller isn’t very appealing indeed.

My Dad is a storyteller extraordinaire. I have wonderful happy memories of listening to him telling us Lancashire Monologues, tales of his childhood or even of his time down the pit. He is a man who can weave a tale out of nothing much and make you want to hear more. I still can’t hear “there’s famous seaside place called Blackpool, that’s noted for fresh air and fun…” without being transported to some fireside, somewhere in my childhood, with Jan and I either side of my Dad, his arms around us both, hearing about “the stick with its ‘orses ‘ead ‘andle” and where it got shoved!

Yes, storytellers are to be cherished.