Will's latest story

I’m working on the personal feature story about a young man who was or might have been a hero when Minneapolis’ 35W bridge collapsed on August 1, 2007. That evening I was at Dinkytown’s Kitty Kat Klub with my French class reviewing for our final examination. Meanwhile my cousin was bee-lining into the middle of the chaos –some Twin Citians have probably called this their own version of September 11th. My cousin did what many others probably want to claim; he risked his to life help another. The story peg is being geared for the six month marker of the event on February 1st.

When my sister told me that our cousin had had a two-fold experience, I wanted to confirm and file that story. It originally seemed that he had helped to save one person’s life and then had the opposite event happen. Well that opposite and hard to swallow story was his.

Traumatically, he had to watch someone die. He has a strong and compelling story about wanting to do the right thing – what your character and conscience demand. His story is similar to movie thrillers where an ordinary person is pushed by his moral calling to attempt the extraordinary.

The story is moving along. While the interview audio and the narration is laid down, important and transcendent elements are missing. I don’t have the audio to create a scene or a full enough sonic, transportational experience.

This is an interesting change from story building in Washington to doing so in Minneapolis. The software and team are new to me. I mentioned, in the prior post, that ProTools was confounding me. I have a different and new learning and working curve.

The good news: I’m free to pursue and file stories and use the skills and knowledge that I got from NPR. The bad news: I haven’t the familiar support network, expertise and software that was my advantage at NPR.