The couple at the heart of this story were initially reluctant to speak with me, and for good reason. Would you be interviewed by a reporter who happened upon your driveway as you were loading the last of the possessions you could salvage from your burned home? The couple had already turned down numerous interview requests, notably from national newspapers and cable news stations. I identified myself as a freelance writer on assignment with the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, which is their local news outlet. Hearing that, their demeanor changed. The wife began talking, on the record, and before long she was touring me around the ruins of her family’s former life.
There’s a couple of points to be made here. One, it’s not uncommon, at least in my experience, for people who are experiencing trauma to want to share what they have been through, even — or perhaps especially? — with a reporter they’ve just met. We are often among the first people on the scene of disaster when the desire to tell the world what happened is most fresh. For this, reporters bear the awesome responsibility to get the details right, but even more than that, to get the story while being sensitive to what that person is going through. “I’m sorry to meet you under these circumstances,” is my standard greeting in these situations. Often, that opens the door.
The bond between a community and its trusted news source is also worth noting here. The couple felt comfortable telling their story only to a reporter representing their local news outlet. The Press Democrat has an amazingly strong bond with its readers and in 2018 won a Pulitzer for its coverage of Wine Country wildfires (I contributed as a freelancer). I worked in the newsroom for close to 20 years. Tragically, the trend in the United States is away from local journalism. Local news is dying at an accelerated rate, a fact made much worse by the pandemic. News “deserts” are spreading across the country, fraying communal bonds, sowing misinformation and furthering our sense of isolation. Stories that need to be told are not getting told. I will never stop appreciating being invited to bear witness. But I fear the day when the door stays closed because I’m viewed as nothing more than a complete and total stranger.
