And then what happened?

If you want to capture the heart of the human experience, level up your interviewing skills. Here's how.

Hi storytellers – 

I used to believe that the most wondrous thing about life as a journalist is access — the license to go places and meet people that “civilians” don’t typically get.

But I was wrong. 

What’s truly wondrous are the revelatory moments that come from this access: the hushed walk down a darkened hall toward the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), a nurse explaining how dangerous light and noise are for fragile infants, some the size of my hand.

Photo by Aditya Romansa on Unsplash

Sitting with a young mother at a playground picnic table, her nine-year-old son playing nearby, as she tells me how hard it is to get a job after serving prison time — how she isn’t sure she can resist the temptation to return to dealing drugs in a town where few legitimate economic options exist.

The joy of perching on the cockswain’s seat on a dragon boat, recording an elite racing crew as they train for …