A Naperville woman planted a seed that is now sprouting leaves – each one symbolizing someone’s story.
Rachna Prasad is one of the producers for The People Tree. The storytelling platform started in 2016 with eight people in her living room. Prasad said a woman in her neighborhood had committed suicide. Prasad realized how much she didn’t know her neighbor and then it hit her -- she didn’t know most her neighbors. Prasad is a fan of The Moth Radio Hour on National Public Radio she said listening to this show sparked an idea.
“And what I decided to do was do a similar thing, which is find a theme,” she said. “So, the theme I chose for the very first time was called ‘First Days,’ because everyone has a first day. Everyone has that experience of whether it's the first day of a marriage, a job, a school, any kind of first day.”
Prasad said this format helped start conversations because people started to realize that they were not alone in their journey.
The group flourished and in January 2017, Prasad said they had to move out of the small space and into a different venue. Before COVID-19 hit, she said, around 230 people would come out to listen to the stories. The virus put a halt to that. But Prasad said they are starting to rebound from the pandemic-inflicted slowdown.
Simi Krishnan is another coproducer for the People Tree. Krishnan moved to Naperville 15 years ago from London. She said she never came across anything like this in her former city.
Krishnan started out as a storyteller but then one of the producers had to move out of state. Prasad asked her if she wanted to take their place.
“And I just jumped at the chance,” she said. “I was like, absolutely, you know, this is my passion. And you know, all of us work nine to five jobs. And this service is a passion project. It's not something that I do full time.”
The most recent event took place March 16 at Empire Bar and Grill in Naperville. Doug Krause has attended these events for the past three years. He sat at the bar, waiting to hear the narratives of the night.
“I love hearing other people's stories,” Krause explained. “I enjoy those that bring laughter. I enjoy those that bring sorrow.”
Krause said he sometimes comes to share his own stories.
Ernst Lisek was also in the audience that night. It was his first time attending an event like this but said he will come again.
“This isn't something you see with any other types of media and it's local, that's always nice to have people in your community,” he said. “But it's refreshing. It's new. It's different.”
Erica Katz is another producer for the group but that night she also had a story to share.
Katz explained in her story how, as a nurse, she was able to bond with a person who was not in a good place.
“So, I said, ‘Yeah, I heard you want to hurt yourself.’ And then he puts his head down,” she explained. Then he said ‘well I don't want to hurt myself. I just don't want to be here.’”
She connected with him by sharing a personal story about a family member of hers.
Prasad said the producers work with those wanting to share their lives by offering them workshops that help bring their stories to life. They sometimes must tell potential participants that they aren’t yet ready to share.
“And we say, ‘you know, come back when you're maybe on the other end, because that's when you get perspective. You have to be able to reflect on what happened and where you are,’” she explained. “The way I always see a story is it's about an incident usually, and who you were before that incident and who you are after that.”
Prasad explained that the listeners are just as important as the speakers during this experience.
“It's a symbiotic relationship, they work together, and each one is giving a gift,” she said. “The storyteller is sharing something of their life. And the listener is giving them the gift of being heard, ‘like I'm listening to you.’ And it's really important that both of them are fully engaged.”
Prasad said there are communities that The People Tree are still trying to reach. The first are older individuals, the other teenagers.
The People Tree performances take place once a month. Stories in each performance must follow a particular theme. Information about future sessions can be found on The People Tree Facebook page.
- Yvonne Boose is a current corps member for Report for America, an initiative of the GroundTruth Project. It's a national service program that places talented journalists in local newsrooms like WNIJ. You can learn more about Report for America at wnij.org.
