This is the Moth Radio Hour.
I'm Kate Tellers.
A few years ago, I was walking through Brooklyn,
wearing my first child in a carrier on my chest.
It had just rained and I stepped on a piece of wet newspaper and fell face-forward towards the sidewalk.
As my baby's tiny, perfect head careened towards the cement,
my whole life flashed in front of my eyes, and then I went blank.
Suddenly, we were on the ground, both crying, while a stranger helped us up.
I checked my baby.
He was fine.
I pulled out a baby wipe from my bag to clean up the gravel on the hand that I had wrapped around his head.
It wasn't until 20 minutes later when a cashier I was trying to pay stared open mouth at my hand that I realized that it was oozing with blood.
I hadn't noticed.
I hadn't felt it.
We were saved by my natural instincts that I didn't even know that I had,
reminding me that we're all more hardwired to our natural selves than we likely even realize.
In this episode, stories of humans and nature, how we coexist and how we communicate,
and what happens when our natural instincts take the wheel.
First up, a story from our Boston open mic story slam,
where we partner with public radio station WBUR.