Archived: Storytelling inspiration
- morganlegret
- Feb 24
- 2 min read
October 2, 2022
A story that stuck with me is the personal narrative “I just hugged the man who murdered my son.” by Mary Johnson and Oshea Israel. Not only was this story an incredible insight on how people can change their outlook on the reality of a harsh situation, but hearing the story told in their own voices via podcast audio, makes it an intimate and vulnerable experience with the listener.
The biggest thing that captured my attention when listening to this excerpt was that even though this was a conversation between a man (Oshea Israel) and the mother of the son he had killed (Mary Johnson), it didn’t explicitly state the events that occurred. Instead, it jumped right into after they first met.
As readers and listeners we can gather the context in the description below to focus on more important aspects of the conversation rather than the events. To me, the most important part of this exchange was that it demonstrated how people can change. Even though this man took away this mother’s son, their conversation put forward the evolution of their relationship.
The real turning point came from the powerful quote and title of this audio clip, “I just hugged the man that murdered my son.” where the conversation then shifted towards the mother’s forgiveness and her relationship with her son’s murderer moving forward.
The conversational aspect demonstrated the evolution of their relationship. We are hearing them speak together, and compliment what the other says rather than hearing them as two opposing characters. Which is something you would normally expect from the dynamic considering the situation. Now they lean on one another, it is the beauty that came from tragedy. Mary Johnson now sees him, and cares for him as if he were her own son. She now gets to do all the things with Oshea Israel that she would unfortunately never be able to do with her son.
I am mainly shocked at the inspiration that comes from this piece. Obviously this is an unusual situation that not many people have to experience in their lives. However, this story can be applied to all aspects of life and sends a message about forgiveness and human evolution. It challenged me because I could never imagine the strength that must come from both Mary Johnson and Oshea Israel to get to where they are now. Most people live in resent, but these two were able to take their pain and find new meaning in it in order to push forward.
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