The Moth Radio Hour: Inner Compass
53:26 Share

Support comes from Zuckerman Spader. Through nearly five decades of taking on high-stakes legal matters, Zuckerman Spader is recognized nationally as a premier litigation and investigations firm. Their lawyers routinely represent individuals, organizations, and law firms in business disputes, government, and internal investigations, and at trial, when the lawyer you choose matters most. Online at Zuckerman.com.

The Moth Podcast is brought to you by Progressive, where drivers who save by switching save nearly $750 on average. Quote now at Progressive.com. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. National average 12-month savings of $744 by new customers surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2022 and May 2023. Potential savings will vary.

Hey there. We here at The Moth have an exciting opportunity for high school sophomores, juniors, and seniors who love to tell stories. Join The Moth Story Lab this fall. Whether for an aspiring writer, a budding filmmaker, or simply someone who loves to spin a good yarn, this workshop is a chance to refine the craft of storytelling. From brainstorming to that final mic drop moment, we've got students covered.

Plus, they'll make new friends, build skills that shine in school and beyond, and have a blast along the way. These workshops are free and held in person in New York City or virtually anywhere in the U.S. Space is limited. Apply now through September 22nd at themoth.org slash students. That's themoth.org slash students.

From PRX, this is the Moth Radio Hour. I'm Jennifer Hickson. In this hour, we'll hear stories from three people who saw an injustice and took action. Their foes are varied. The criminal justice system, Soviet bureaucracy, or a single menacing adversary. Stories from people who engaged the problem, whether it was blaringly loud or, as in this first story, completely silent. It comes from Phyllis Bodrum, who we first met at a story slam in the Bronx. Here's Phyllis.

It's 1979 and summer in New York City. That was 38 years ago when I was being interviewed for a promotion from secretary to coordinator of daytime casting at ABC. I wore my new silk blouse, matching slim skirt, and two-inch yellow slingback heels. I thought I was ready.

although there was some who thought I wasn't tough enough to hold on to a job like that. And somewhere in a tiny corner of my mind, there was a part of me that suspected, feared that they might be right. I even had a secretary come up to me and say, "Phyllis, you're too nice." And to which I responded, "Thank you." In any case,

I was meeting a friend from lunch across the street before my two o'clock interview. And when I got there, I found hordes of people spanning the length and the width of the sidewalk in front of the building, three people deep. But I found a gap, cut through it, and when I got into the center of this human oval, something came up behind me, grabbed me,

prevented me from moving, pinning my arms to my sides. And I looked over both shoulders to see if I could find out what it was, but I didn't see anything. So I started to struggle, and the more I struggled, the tighter the grip became. And then I looked to the sea of faces for some clue, some information that would help me to understand what was holding me, what was going on.

but they were just placidly chewing and eating their lunch and staring at me. Suddenly, the pressure was released and a set of rough hands groped me in every part of my body and then pushed me in my lower back. I stumbled forward, almost falling, but I regained my balance and I turned around to find a six-foot mime leering at me.

He was in full dress with the beret, the face paint, the polo shirt, the suspenders, the black pants, and the very comfortable sneakers.

He was beckoning to me and slapping his behind, inviting me to hit him. And I took the bait. I wrapped the strap of my purse around my hand and I went after him and I swung. And just as my purse was about to connect, he bounced to another side of the oval.

and leered at me again and beckoned me a second time and patted his behind and wagged it at me as an invitation to come and try again. And I did. And this time, I swung so hard that when he darted out of the way, the momentum pulled me forward and I almost stumbled and fell. And then the people started to laugh.

and I was feeling like a real fool. So when he beckoned me for the third time, common sense prevailed. Slim skirt, heels, sneakers.

I'm outmatched. You got it, I said, and I turned and walked away and tried to go up those stairs to get into the building when he rushed up behind me and grabbed my behind and squeezed it and then darted to safety down further in the oval, and people started to laugh.

And I just stood there as waves of humiliation and rage ran through my... And I finally got myself together. Got up the stairs, got into the building, got to the cafeteria where they were serving my favorite, turkey tetrazzini. And I went through the motions, paid for my food, and sat at the table, but I couldn't eat or speak.

I had just been blindsided, bullied, and blatantly violated by a strange man in the street with the approval of hordes of other strangers. And the thought that I had no way to protect or defend myself made me feel so powerless that I wanted to cry. So I just sat there.

Then I remembered something that I might have at the bottom of my purse that I bought from a 99-cent store four months prior as a joke. And I started digging down into my purse, and the minute my fingers touched that cold, hard canister, I realized that I might have some options after all. I picked it up.

I wrapped my napkin around it and I said, gotta go. And turned and got back outside to see if he was still there. And of course he was. And I worked my way to the front of the crowd because it had swollen to five people deep to see what he was up to. And just as I looked up,

A beautiful blonde in a pretty red dress cut through the crap just as I had and just as she was about to mount the stairs. He snuck up behind her and as she raised one foot, he insinuated his way between her legs and stood up, essentially mounting her on his lower back.

like a rider on a horse. He reached under her dress, grabbed her legs, and proceeded to gallop around the oval with this woman's hair flying, arms flailing, holding onto her purse while trying to keep from falling backwards.

When he let her down, he promptly lifted her dress up over her head and held it there to the hoots and the whistles of the men. And when he finally let her go, she staggered into the building and quickly disappeared. And I said to myself, is this 1979 in New York City? Or have I been dropped into the Twilight Zone? Happening!

the police. And as I said that, this elderly gentleman, tall, handsome, distinguished man, stepped into the oval with an old woman in tow. She was holding on to the back of his jacket and he strode over to the mine.

And she peered out at the mime, cringed and darted back. And I said to myself, now what did he do to this old woman that would have her cringing at the sight of him? And sure enough, the old man started shaking his finger in the mime's face and the mime

innocence. The hands and shoulders went up in the air like he was the victim. And he put on this terrible sad face and mimed crying. And someone in the crowd yelled, boo, boo, leave the mime alone. And the crowd picked up the chant, boo, boo,

Leave the mime alone. And the old man looked up startled into the hostile, menacing eyes of the wolf pack consisting of executives, clerks, messengers, a UPS driver, a postal employee, even a hot dog vendor selling his food was enjoying this spectacle. And the old man shook his head sadly.

gently took the old woman by the hand and led her out of the crowd. And that's when I got it. It was nothing but a big show. This was theater in the round. And every unsuspecting woman who cut through the crowd became a player whether she wanted to or not.

She became the catch of the day on the mime's lunchtime menu. Subject to any form of abuse, he chose to cook up to feed vicariously the appetites of his patrons. And so, when he started looking around for a new player, I stepped back into the human arena and waited.

He spotted me, he came towards me, and as he got closer, his eyes narrowed, and I couldn't tell whether it was because of his recognizing me from before, from what he had done to me,

or whether he was strategizing how he was going to launch this frontal attack because his M.O. was to play dirty pool and sneak up behind the woman and catch her off guard. But when he got two feet away, I lifted my can of pepper spray and I sprayed him in his face.

And his eyes got wild and he reached for my throat and I took two steps back and I sprayed him again and again. I sprayed him like a roach and then he began to cough and wheeze and sneeze and he started staggering towards the street and his loyal patrons parted and let him go.

He wound up on the hood of a parked car, and I stood there and enjoyed watching him wheeze and sneeze, and as I was doing that, something karate chopped my right hand. It's another mime! And this one, and the other one, and this hulking Goliath of a man is glowering at me like he wants to kill me.

And we both hear my canister rolling slowly but noisily down the sidewalk. And he numbered towards it. And I whirled around. And I went after it. And the two of us scrambled to get to that canister. And I got there first. And he moved towards me. And I took a wide stance. And I got the way down. And I started rocking. And I said, you want this?

And get him! He stopped cold in his tracks. And we looked at each other, both knowing that if he ever got his hands on me, he could break me in two. But that day, I had had enough and seen enough pushing and grabbing and groping. That day, I was prepared to die.

and I wasn't leaving the planet alone, he must have seen it in the rocking or read it in my eyes because they were saying, kill the mime because he backed up, turned around, and disappeared back into that crowd.

And by now, the spray is starting to spread to his patrons. And they are coughing and wheezing and sneezing and quickly disperse without leaving a dime in his beret. So I dropped my canister back in my purse and I stood up only to realize that I had bent the heel on my shoe.

and I had split my seam on my skirt all the way up to my behind. And I had an interview at two o'clock. So I hobbled back across the street

And I got on that elevator and got to my office and grabbed my scotch tape and my stapler. I rushed into the ladies room, locked the door, took off my skirt, turned it inside out and pinched that seam back together.

I pinched and stapled and pinched and stapled until I got that whole thing closed. Then I taped down one side with the scotch tape and the other side, and then one going straight down the center in the hopes that no one would ever know what had just happened across the street. I went to my desk, and I reached in my bottom drawer for a pair of flats that I always keep there.

and put them on and waited for that call from personnel. And when they called me, I went upstairs, marched into that office and aced that interview and got the job. Oh yes, oh yes. And that was the day that I got in touch with my other side. Now she doesn't make many appearances.

but she's available on an as-need basis. And I call her my quiet fire. And we both thank you. That was Phyllis Bodwin.

No surprise she excelled at her job as coordinator of casting for ABC. In addition, Phyllis is an award-winning writer, jewelry designer, and artist. She currently works in the Bronx at the Neighborhood Women's Collective, where she mentors women and girls. So look out, predatory mimes. To see a picture of Phyllis, visit themoth.org, where you can also see a photo of the now legendary canister of pepper spray. Yes, you heard right. She still has it. ♪

You can share these stories or others from the Moth Archive and buy tickets to moth storytelling events in your area through our website, themoth.org. There are moth events year-round. Find a show near you and come out to tell a story. And find us on social media, too. We're on Facebook and Twitter, at The Moth. In a moment, a woman, her sled, her pack of dogs, and the Soviet Empire, when the Moth Radio Hour continues.

The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts and presented by PRX.

This is the Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Jennifer Hickson. This next story was told at the Moth's first show in Anchorage, Alaska, where we partnered with their local storytelling organization, Arctic Entries. I heard about Sue Steinecker's story from another teller who didn't have Sue's phone number. She suggested I call the local radio station because, quote, everyone knows everyone in Nome.

I thought that was probably an exaggeration, but I called KNOM, and in a big long-winded way asked the person who answered the phone if they knew of this woman, Sue Steinecker. Well, he interrupted me politely and said, Oh yeah, I know Sue. I just dog-sad for her a few weeks ago. I'll have her give you a call. So, here's Sue Steinecker, live in Anchorage, Alaska. Well, we all had a lot of good laughs back when Sarah Palin was running for vice president with this.

But I'm here to tell you the truth, that there are people in Alaska that can see Russia from their house. You see, the Alaska mainland and the Russian mainland are less than 60 miles apart. This is what forms the Bering Strait. And right in the middle of the Bering Strait are two small islands just 2.5 miles apart.

And the border between our two countries runs right down between those two islands. And that means that the people who live on Little Diomede, whenever they look out their window, they can't help but see Russia. Now, also, the international date line runs between those two islands. And the Diometers kind of get a kick out of saying, "Well, we live in today, but we're looking at tomorrow."

But the Russians get an even bigger kick out of saying, "We live in today and look at yesterday." Well, I'm old enough that I was born or grew up during the height of the Cold War in what was called the "duck and cover" years. Because as elementary kids, we went through regular drills where we had to duck under our desks and cover our heads in case the Soviet Union dropped an atomic bomb on us.

So I grew up very fearful of the Soviet Union. It seemed like a very dark, very grim, and very distant place. So in 1985, when I landed on Little Diomede as a wildlife biologist to work on a walrus study with the local people, I found myself face-to-face with what I had grown up believing was the evil empire.

Well, fortunately, there was a warming, a political warming between our countries in the late 1980s. And this led to an opening and an opportunity to visit. Well, this ice curtain that ran between these two islands and divided our Bering Strait began to thaw. And the first people to take advantage of this were adventurers who wanted to cross the Bering Strait.

And because of my connection with the little diameters, it actually led to an invitation to bring my dog team over to the USSR. Now, my most favorite thing in life had been seeing Alaska from the back of a dog sled pulled by my nine best friends. These dogs were my family. And because I loved to travel and camp, I was partial to really big, tall, legged, happy dogs. But I had one dog in there

that was a misfit. And this was a small, tiny, little white husky with ice blue eyes named Vixen. And I had taken her simply because a friend was desperate to find a home for her. Well, she remained shy with other people, but she formed a bond with me and very soon she was a steadfast member of our team.

So in April of 1990, myself and another American are in Nome, Alaska, and we are loading up all our dogs, our dog sleds, our gear into a small Bering airplane. We take off from Nome, Alaska, and an hour and 20 minutes later, we land a world away in Providenia, USSR. We mushed our dogs right out of the airport and out onto the ice, where there was a big bonfire and a picnic.

And these people who I had grown up thinking of as my enemy were welcoming us and embracing us with an outpouring of friendship and goodwill and vodka. We started our journey the very next day. There was us two Americans, there were four non-native Russians, and two Russian Chukchi mushers.

and we were to embark on a two-week, 200-mile northbound journey up the coast of the USSR.

It's beautiful country, it's completely treeless country. And we traversed mountains, rolling tundra, sea ice, and visited these far-flung native villages all along the coast. And everywhere we went, we were greeted with tremendous friendship and generosity, and women with basins of seal meat and walrus meat for our dogs. One particularly memorable day, we crested a hill, and it

It just disoriented me a moment because I found myself staring at the Diomede Islands from the opposite side. It was like looking in a mirror. And for the first time, this divided Bering Strait became whole.

Well, two weeks passed far too quickly and we found ourselves at our final destination, the village of Uelen, where we were met both by traditional native dances as well as two Soviet biplanes parked on the ice of the lagoon behind the village. They were there to carry our dog teams back to Providenia where we'd begun this trip.

So we loaded our sleds and our dogs and our gear into these planes. I sat on my sled, and I clipped my dogs in all around me. We taxied down the lagoon, lifted into the air. I could look out this small window, and I could see the villagers down below waving at us. And then all of a sudden, the plane erupted with panicked commands in Russian that I, of course, didn't understand.

But I lay down on my sled and I braced myself. We were about 100 feet up and the plane stalled and it just fell and crashed, almost belly flopped down on the ice. The next thing I remember was waking up to the sounds of frantic dogs barking and the smell of fuel.

I was injured, but I was able to go around and unclip each one of my dogs loose. The very last dog was Vixen, and she was on her side thrashing about with fuel spilling down on her from the wing. And as I carried her and pitched her out of the plane, I stepped over the body of one of my dogs that I knew now had died.

Well, once out on the ice, we all regrouped. I learned that two more dogs had died, and then, far more tragically, one of our Russian teammates had been killed as well. The grief-stricken villagers, they took myself and the other wounded Russian on sleds, and they carried us back to their village, and they put us in their clinic for the night.

And early the next morning, one of my teammates came and they said, "Well, we've been rounding up all the dogs and we found all of them except Vixen." And then they said, "There is also a Russian military helicopter on its way. They want to get you and your dogs, the wounded American, out of the Soviet Union as fast as possible." I begged them, "Please, let me stay. Let me look for my dog. She's very shy. She's not going to come to anyone but me." But they wouldn't allow it.

And as they were loading me onto the helicopter, I think in a desire to make up for my losses, one of the women from the village put a little brown puppy in my lap. So very quickly, we were back in Providenia, and even quicker, back in Nome, Alaska. I had four broken ribs and some pretty serious bruising.

But I was able to take comfort. I could call an English-speaking woman in the village of Uellen, trying to find my dog, and she would tell me how she and her daughter were walking the hills and calling for Vixen, and that hunters were putting meat by the plane in an effort to draw her in.

but no one had seen her. But she did offer me some comfort when she said that my former teammates had dug a shallow grave and buried all three dogs that had died together, and that they had made sure that my dog's head was pointed east towards his home in Alaska. So six weeks passed, and still no word of Vixen. And one day I get a call from Bering Air that a letter has come over for me from Providenia.

I run down, I rip it open, my God, my friend writes he has found Vixen. Apparently all this time while everyone was looking for her up north, she was retracing our trackless journey all the way back to Providenia. And she had been found amongst the other stray dogs in Providenia and she was still wearing her American-style harness almost two months after the crash.

My friend wrote, "Vixen is still shy and when I went to grab her, she ducked into a tunnel." And he said, "I had to crawl 50 meters in the darkness, the dirtness, and the dustness until he had her cornered." And he said, "And then we had a 30-minute conversation in English before he felt he could grab her."

So I immediately run home. I call my friend. I say, oh my God, she must be sick. She must be thin. She must be starved after this journey. And he said, Susana, my wife Luba is a very good cook. Okay. So some days go by. The next Bering Air flight returns from Providenia. I go down to claim my dog and there's no vixen.

I run back to home. I call Oleg. Oleg, what's the problem? And he says, ah, Susanna, it's something about that disease that makes dogs crazy. And I was like, okay, rabies, of course. Well, she's got all of her vaccinations, and I gather up her vaccinations and her tags, and I send them back over on bearing air, and I wait for the return flight. And again, no vixen.

We go through this. One time there's been a quarantine, another time there's another problem, and finally it's like, "Oleg, please!" And he said, "Suzanna, the authorities, they're just not very interested in your dog." Well, this was an extraordinary time in the reconnection between the United States and the Soviet Union. And for about three years, the Soviets really cared about how they were being viewed in the American press. So I took a chance.

And I told my friend a very big lie. I said, Oleg, do your authorities understand that there are newspaper reporters here and radio station people and television reporters? They're all here waiting for this dog to come home. Oh, Susanna, you should have told me this sooner. Vixen was home on the next flight. And she was looking good. I was expecting a skinny dog, and that's not what I got.

And as soon as I had her home, I called my friend again and I felt like I needed to fess up that I'd lied. And he said, "Oh, Susanna, you understand the Russian system. Very good." So I felt like I told a lie to get Vixen home. So what I decided, I would call the Anchorage Daily News and I'd give them the story.

They seemed interested. They wrote it up. They put it out on the Associated Press. And lo and behold, that story got picked up by newspapers all across the country, even around the world. And eventually, she made it into Ripley's Believe It or Not. But I had told the story before I realized that the reason Vixen was looking so filled out wasn't just because of Luba's good cooking, but my little girl had come home pregnant.

Less than two months later, she gave birth to seven Russian-American puppies. I named every one of them for one of my new dear Russian friends, and the local press dubbed them the Glossnose Pups. So this was truly an extraordinary and an exuberant time in the reconnection between our two countries. And just as miraculous as this little dog...

finding her way all the way back to Providenia, 200 miles without a trail, was that people who had long lived in fear and distrust of one another had come together out of friendship to bring a little lost dog home. Thank you.

That was Sue Steinecker, who flew 500 miles from Nome to Anchorage to share her story, bringing along several giant empty suitcases so she could load up on supplies at the big stores in Anchorage. Sue's an artist, photographer, and nature lover. She lives in Nome with her husband and her loving pack of dogs.

Pro tip, if you're going to call Sue, don't call her at noon Alaska time, because in Nome, at noon, the fire station sounds its alarm, and Sue's dogs go crazy. It takes them quite a while to simmer down. Take a listen. This is Zach, Zoe, Zeevon, and Zelda. Okay, nice job.

Next up, a teenager is moved by the story of a man on death row and decides to write him a letter when the Moth Radio Hour continues. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts and presented by the Public Radio Exchange, prx.org.

You're listening to the Moth Radio Hour from PRX. I'm Jennifer Hickson. We first met Gautam Narula when he called the moth's pitch line. More on that later. He eventually told this story at a moth show at Greenwood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York, where we partnered with public radio station WNYC. Here's Gautam. When I was 15 years old, there were just two things I needed for a great day. The first was chocolate chip waffles for breakfast.

And the second was a chess tournament after school. I was a good, if apathetic, student. I had a penchant for really bad puns. I used to wear these big baggy shirts that my mom would buy me. And I was kind of nerdy and awkward. And I think the worst part, the worst part, was that I had this long shaggy hair that kind of made me look like a Bollywood Anakin Skywalker, if you can picture that. It wasn't a good look. It wasn't. I don't know what I was thinking.

But that was me at 15, and I gotta say, looking back on it, that kid didn't seem like the type who'd get involved with a notorious death row inmate. It started with a phone call. It was from a friend who told me about this man named Troy Davis. Now, Davis was convicted in 1991 of murdering a police officer, and the conviction didn't have any physical evidence. No gun, no DNA. So instead, the conviction was based on nine eyewitness testimonies. But in the years since the trial,

Seven of those nine came forward and said that they lied because the police had coerced and intimidated them. And so now Davis was trying to take this evidence to court, any court, but none of them would give him a hearing. I had this naive view of the justice system and it just didn't seem like it could be true. But there was one small detail that I couldn't get out of my mind. And it was the fact that the state of Georgia, my home state,

was going to execute Troy Davis a week before the Supreme Court was supposed to review the case. And that didn't make any sense. This was 2008. Troy Davis had been on death row for 17 years. Why couldn't Georgia wait one more week? Something was wrong. I started following the news really closely. And when I found out that the Supreme Court, 90 minutes before the execution, issued an emergency stay so they could have more time to review the case, well, I decided to do something I had never done before.

I decided to write a letter, a physical letter. Now I didn't really know how, I had to ask my dad where to put the stamp and I wanted to write this letter because I just wanted this Troy Davis guy, whoever he was, to know that there was someone on the outside who cared that there was something wrong about this. And so I wrote my letter and I sent it off and I didn't really think much of it but he wrote back. And now for the first time in my entire life I received a letter.

And this one had death row as the return address. And that's how I found out that not only did Troy read my letter, but he wanted me to come visit him on death row. I didn't want to go. I was scared. He was 39 and I was 15. He grew up in a poor neighborhood full of drugs and gangs. And I grew up in an affluent suburb full of manicured lawns and overpriced coffee shops. He was a convicted cop killer. And I was the president of chess club.

But he could face another execution date in a matter of just a few days. I felt like I couldn't say no to him. It reminded me when my dad and I would walk through downtown Atlanta and homeless people would ask us for money. And my dad would just lie and say he didn't have any and walk right through. And so I just followed his lead. But it felt wrong not to help someone who was so nearby and so clearly in need. And now Troy Davis was less than 100 miles away from where I stood, possibly about to be executed for a crime he didn't commit.

I couldn't walk right through again. So I decided to see him. I was too young to drive, so I needed a ride. And the pool of options to get a ride to death row is pretty small. And my mom hadn't driven me to soccer practice or to chess club in years. But early on a Saturday morning, she hopped in behind the driver's seat and packed some sandwiches. And she made the two-hour drive to take her teenage son to death row, like all moms do. That's

And when we got there, we went through security and they took our keys and our wallets and IDs. And then we walked through this hall of Orwellian motivational posters that said things like integrity, courage, and justice. And then up a flight of stairs and into this lobby. I tell one of the guards, I'm here to see Troy Davis. And he motions me over to this cage that they call a special visitation cell.

And he unlocks the cage, ushers me in, and then locks it again. And so here I am, 15 years old, in a cage with three convicted murderers, and the only guards are on the other side of a locked door. But the first thing I noticed about Troy was just how warm he was. As soon as he saw me, he said, wow, you're tall, in his deep Savannah drawl.

And then he motioned for me to sit next to him. He thanked me for my letter, which he said was now taped up on the wall of his cell. And then he told me his version of what happened the night the police officer was killed. How it was a chaotic scene. The cops were knocking down doors, trying to find out who did it, trying to find out anything. And when they arrested him, even though he didn't have a gun that night, the media, before his trial, before his conviction, erased his identity as Troy Davis and gave him a new one.

cop killer. And now he had to reckon with being a black man in the 1980s in South Georgia accused of killing a white cop. When our time was up, Troy hugged me and said, "I'll see you again real soon." And over the next few years, I saw him many times on death row, as did my family. And we exchanged letters and we talked on the phone. And during this time, more people found out about the case and soon Troy was the face of a worldwide movement.

A million people signed petitions trying to get him released. Talking heads on CNN would discuss his case every night. And there were rallies in every major American city, most major European ones, and even Lagos, Nigeria, all with the same message: "Free Troy Davis." I would always tell Troy about these rallies because I didn't want him to forget that there were people on the outside fighting for him. And by this time, Troy started calling me his adopted nephew, and he signed his letters "Uncle Troy."

and he would ask me about my grades and remind me to study for tests. And he was more excited about my SAT scores than my own parents were. And he'd teach me dance moves because he was a really good dancer and I wasn't. And then he'd make fun of me for how awkward I was around girls. And Troy and I would often talk about what he was going to do when he got out. And he said on the first night he was going to do two things. First, he was going to take a hot bath, which he hadn't done since 1989.

And second, he was going to sleep at the foot of his mother's bed so when she woke up, she would know that this wasn't a dream and that her son was home for real. Longer term, he wanted to speak to kids in middle schools and high schools, especially troubled kids, and show them how his faith had given him the strength to persevere through two decades of death row. And so if he could do that, they could do anything they put their minds to.

And he promised to take me fishing since I'd never been before. And in return, I promised him, uh, I promised to teach him how to use a computer and how to use Facebook. And Troy always thought he was going to get out. He always thought he was going to be set free. And that's why for all four of his execution dates, he refused his final meal. Because to him, it wasn't going to be his final meal. I still remember that fourth execution date. September 21st, 2011. It was a Wednesday.

I had just started my freshman year of college and I finished my very first college exam and then I hopped in my little red Chevy and made the drive down to the prison grounds to join the protests with thousands of other people. My family was there too, my younger sister and both my parents. And my parents had been divorced for nearly a decade at that point but we all came together that night because we all loved Troy. At 7 o'clock, the moment of execution,

The crowd went silent and I just stared out into the setting sun, wondering if they were injecting Uncle Troy with poison. At 7:02, the crowd erupted into a roar. The Supreme Court had issued an emergency one-day stay of execution, and somehow Troy, yet again, had pulled off another miracle. And so I said goodbye to my family and I got back in my little red Chevy and drove back to my dorm and made a mental promise to Troy that I'd be back on those prison grounds protesting the next day.

And when I got back, I was hanging out with some friends, just trying to unwind from all the events of the night, and I felt my phone buzz in my pocket. And so I pulled it out and flipped it open, because I was a Neanderthal who sold a flip phone, and it was a text message from a friend, and it just said, Gotham, I'm so sorry. And that's when I learned the one-day stay of execution was a lie.

The Supreme Court had only saved the execution for a few hours so they could issue a one-sentence, 23-word statement saying they would not intervene, and so Troy Davis would be executed tonight, now. And instead of being out on those prison grounds with my family and spiritually with Troy, I was instead alone in my blue "I am Troy Davis" t-shirt, hunched over on the couch in my dorm room lobby, watching Anderson Cooper on CNN countdown, and then finally announced that the state of Georgia had executed Troy Davis.

And Troy wouldn't have known that I wasn't out on those prison grounds while he was being strapped to the gurney, but I knew. And I felt like in his final moments, I had abandoned him. That I had abandoned Uncle Troy. An acquaintance walked in and she saw my shirt and she saw the announcement on TV and she said, What do you think of all this Troy Davis stuff? I couldn't say anything. Not a word. Not to her. Or to the people I passed on the way back to my room. Not to my roommate. And not even to myself as I drifted off into a numb sleep knowing deep down that

this wasn't justice, this was a murder. The next day, I received a letter. And before I looked at the sender's name, I knew who it was from. I had seen that broad looped script far too many times not to know who wrote it. And so the day after he was executed, I received the final letter I would ever get from Troy Davis. It took me an hour to build up the courage to open it because it seemed like as long as that letter was still sealed, Troy was still alive.

In the letter, he talks about how he's excited to see my first semester's grades, and he wonders what college is like, and asked if it was hard being away from my family for the first time. And he reminded me to be a good brother to my younger sister. I try to keep Troy's story alive today, so people don't forget the truth of who he was or what really happened. And I fight to end the death penalty so I can honor Troy's final request that he made to his supporters just moments before his execution, that they go and fight for the other Troy Davises out there.

I was 15 when I met Troy, 18 when he was executed, and I'm 24 now. And I find myself just missing the conversations that we never had and thinking about the questions I wish I'd asked. And I also often think about the final piece of life advice that he gave in that final letter. He wrote, "You know I'm proud of you, but I want you to focus on the direction you want your life to go. Every action you take directs your tomorrow. I want you to enjoy your youth,

But never forget to tell the people you love what they mean to you. Troy, you meant everything. Thank you. That was Gotham Narula. To learn more about Gotham and Troy Davis and their unique friendship, you can read Gotham's memoir, Remain Free, which includes all of their correspondence. Gotham is currently studying artificial intelligence with the long-term goal of finding ways to reform the criminal justice system.

As you heard, we met Gotham on our pitch line. And I want to let you know that you can pitch us your story by recording it right now on our site at themoth.org or call 877-799-MOTH. That's 877-799-6684. The best pitches are developed for moth shows all around the globe. Hi, my name is Shelley Wright. My story is called Two Phone Calls.

And the first phone call came on the morning of September 11th. It was that horrible phone call. The call was actually from my mother. She was calling to tell me that one of the towers had been hit and that she was fine and not to worry about her. And as we were on the phone with her, her tower was hit and we could hear voices.

what was going on. And she said she was going to call me when she got out of the building. And of course, that phone call never did come. But the second phone call that I got, which was about three weeks later, was from a man named John. And he was calling to tell me that he owed her, in essence, his life. He worked with her years and years and years prior. And it was during that time that he was diagnosed with both AIDS and cancer and given two years to live. And

And he went to my mom asking basically for a shoulder to cry on. And the story that he told me was that she did the opposite. You know, she said, how dare you? How dare you take whatever time you have left in this world and feel sorry for yourself?

And she said, you know, she took them outside at this was, you know, New York City in the middle of the workday. And she took them outside and said, see that sunshine, see those clouds, look how beautiful this day is. This is it. This is what you get. You get today. I get today. You get today. We all do.

And I think the interesting thing is that everybody talks about living in the moment and appreciating every day, but she truly believed it. She truly lived her life that way. And she encouraged him to stop living in counting away the days or whatever time. And she said, doctors don't know. They make a good guess, but who knows? You can't live with that kind of death sentence. You just have to live today. And then tomorrow you live tomorrow. And the beauty of the story was that he was calling his

11 years later after getting a two-year to live sentence from his doctor and in tears of sadness at losing my mother but also joy and what she gave to him as a gift and as sad as all of it is it really validated for me that she believed that sentiment that you have to live every day because you never know when it will be your last and I think that she lived her life quite well.

Remember, you can pitch us at 877-799-MOTH or online at themoth.org. That's it for this episode of the Moth Radio Hour. We hope you'll join us next time, and that's the story from the moth.

Your host this hour was Jennifer Hickson. Jennifer also directed the stories in the show. The rest of the Moss directorial staff includes Catherine Burns, Sarah Haberman, Sarah Austin-Ginesse, and Meg Bowles. Production support from Timothy Liu Lee. Moss Stories Are True is remembered and affirmed by the storytellers. Our theme music is by The Drift. Other music in this hour from Albert Collins, Thomas Lieb, and Stellwagen Symphonette.

You can find links to all the music we use at our website. The Moth Radio Hour is produced by me, Jay Allison, with Vicki Merrick at Atlantic Public Media in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. This hour was produced with funds from the National Endowment for the Arts. The Moth Radio Hour is presented by PRX. For more about our podcast, for information on pitching us your own story and everything else, go to our website, themoth.org.