WRITE A LETTER : DROP IT IN : HEAR IT READ

Since 2018, the Story Catcher Mailbox has engaged communities across three Southern California cities impacted by the Thomas Fire — downtown Santa Barbara (in three public locations), Carpinteria’s Linden Avenue corridor, and the Ventura County Fairgrounds. Engagement is intentionally barrier-free, as the project’s mission is large-scale, community-level healing through writing and storytelling.

The Story Catcher Mailbox acknowledges that grief and praise are intimately linked and gives voice to the story of both in each of us. Simply put, when we grieve for something we’ve lost, we’re giving praise for the thing we once loved. And when we sing out our praises for what’s alive in us, there is inherently some grief in connecting to its impermanence.

The Mailbox offers the opportunity for personal healing in four powerful ways. First, you connect with yourself as you write your words down. Then, you release those thoughts, feelings and emotions by dropping your letter in the Mailbox. Next, we invite you to attend a monthly reading for the chance to hear your words read out-loud by someone who is holding the space. Lastly, in doing so, you hear your story read among other stories of grief and of praise, forging a connection in community.

What can we do to ensure that the people most affected by society’s social contracts are also its coauthors? Changing the authors of a contract by involving those most affected in the design work fundamentally changes the contract itself. That’s why it’s so important that we protect our unencumbered right to tell our own story— and feel heard.

As a Social Ethnologist, Danielle Siano designs community engagement programs that offer an outlet for thoughts, feelings and complex emotions. Submissions can be synthesized to provide an introspective cross section analysis of which topics are most concerning to the community’s constituents.

The project received attention from news media and can be found in the links below and as posts on social media sites.