john sharify

It’s been an extraordinary, isolating year for journalists and storytellers. Here’s a chance to get together

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It’s funny: when the year began, I hadn’t planned on attending any journalism or storytelling workshops.

This was abnormal for me. I’ve been a fixture on the workshop circuit – both as speaker and attendee – for years. But I knew my 2020 would be extremely busy. I was tabbed to head to Tokyo for 3 1/2 weeks to cover the Olympics. I had braced myself for several major projects during a presidential election year. And, above all, my wife was due in March with our second daughter.

But as the COVID-19 pandemic began to alter all of our lives, I noticed that the workshops I would have typically attended – or that I had attended in the past – were cancelling their 2020 editions.

This deeply saddened me. We are experiencing a pivotal year for our profession, facing challenges and opportunities in how we tell stories, and feeling an even greater burden to inform our communities amidst a swirl of confusion, misinformation, and noise. And we are mostly isolated in doing so – in our homes, removed from our coworkers, and without the usual opportunities for community and connection.

That’s why I decided to plan a storytelling workshop. And this one’s going to be huge.

I am proud to announce the NPPA Virtual Video Storytelling Workshop, taking place online on Friday, August 7 and Saturday, August 8. The speaker list is full of superstars. The subject matter is both relevant and big-thinking.

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PODCAST EPISODE #74: John Sharify & Joseph Huerta, “Bob’s Choice”

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The most powerful 60 minutes I watched last year came from two storytellers at their best.

John Sharify has won umpteen awards through a reporting career that has spanned decades. Joseph Huerta is assembling an equally impressive resume as a photojournalist, now at WFAA-TV in Dallas. Last year, for their final story together at KING-TV in Seattle, Sharify and Huerta produced an hour-long documentary about a man named Bob.

That man, 75 years old and diagnosed with terminal cancer, had chosen to end his life.

Bob Fuller planned to utilize Washington’s Death with Dignity Act to request a lethal dose of medication on a date of his choosing. Several months before that date, Fuller reached out to Sharify to see if his story was worthy of being told.

Sharify knew he wanted to tell it.

He teamed with Huerta to produce “Bob’s Choice,” which is embedded below and available anytime on YouTube. It is stirring, touching, moving, and just about every other emotional adjective you can name. It is also musical, downright funny at times, and a thorough look at a difficult subject.

Sharify and Huerta are my guests on Episode #74 of the Telling the Story podcast.

This is among the longest episodes I’ve done. That’s partly because of having multiple guests, but it’s mainly because this subject cannot be rushed. Sharify and Huerta discuss their many storytelling decisions on “Bob’s Choice,” but they also open up about their own emotional journeys and the experience of watching someone voluntarily – but peacefully among family and friends – take his own life.

The discussion is heavy, but it’s worth it.

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3 GREAT STORIES: Starring Mother’s Day, Berlin, & cake

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Every week, I shine the spotlight on some of the best storytelling in the business and offer my comments. “3 Great Stories of the Week” will post every Monday at 8 AM.

Anna Jarvis was sorry she ever invented Mother’s Day (5/8/15, BuzzFeed): Cinco de Mayo the classic example of a holiday “celebrated” by so many who know nothing of why it exists.

But what about that other May holiday?

I had little knowledge of the origins of Mother’s Day and was fascinated by this article, which explained them. But Joel Oliphint goes further. Writing for BuzzFeed, he examines the life of the holiday’s founder, Anna Jarvis, who crusaded to both make Mother’s Day a reality and then prevent its commercialization. She was portrayed in the media as a eccentric spinster, but was she?

Oliphint succeeds here by applying a modern-day lens to historical questions. He gives Jarvis a fair shake in every debate about her personality and tactics (she even went after non-profits for, she said, coopting Mother’s Day for their own causes), but he refrains from offering knee-jerk sympathy. Beyond that, he writes an article that is simply interesting from top to bottom.

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