Shannon, a beautiful, young single mother with a navy blue scarf wrapped around her shaved head, sat on her sofa, reminiscing about her life: “I’d like to be remembered as a good mom. I’m brave, but I just feel like I’m doing what anyone would do in this situation.” 

Her eyes shifted toward the floor.

“I want anyone fighting cancer to know there’s hope. I want people to see me as not going down without a fight.”

Sitting across from Shannon is an experienced cameraman hired by Lauren Ferrara, a former Fox 21 TV News anchor. But this isn’t a film clip for the 6 p.m. news. Rather, it’s a life legacy story filmed by Why Wait Stories. 

The video storytelling service was born in 2016 after Ferrara left her news anchor job and followed her passion of talking with people about the legacy they hope to leave behind. 

CAPTURING STORIES

In 2016, Ferrara returned to her family’s home to be with her father, who had terminal cancer. Feeling the weight of her work responsibilities, she flew back to the Springs, only to get the news early the following morning that her father had died. 

At the wake to celebrate his life, she had an epiphany. With so many of her father’s family and friends gathered, she decided the event should be recorded for posterity. What better way to honor the man so dear to her? Ferrara’s family rented an Irish bar and hired a camera crew to film people telling stories about their beloved Irish-American friend—stories which, if weren’t recorded, might have been lost forever.

The experience grew into the basis for an expanded service. She reasoned that surely many other folks would want to honor their loved ones as she sought to do for her father. 

With her media connections, Ferrara found fellow broadcast journalists and all the other requisite professionals needed to produce top-quality video recordings of life stories like those of her father—and of young Shannon from Ohio. 

Shannon is similar to most Why Wait clients in that she’s facing the inevitable. But she’s also different in being so young. Most of the videos produced by Ferrara’s crew are, not surprisingly, of older folks. 

For her 80th birthday, Sue Dilloway commissioned a film that chronicled her travel memories. The longtime Colorado resident recounted how her seventh grade geography teacher went on exotic vacations to “places with strange-sounding names” and talked to the class about them when she came back. 

“Sometime in my early childhood, we had a calendar that had a picture of the Taj Mahal. I always thought someday I would see it. I have seen it—it was a cloudy day—it wasn’t as beautiful as the picture,” Sue said in the video.

She also spoke of her early years in a village near London and how she saw the Luftwaffe bombing during World War II.

LIFE WORTH RECORDING

For now, most are filmed here in Colorado, with Ferrara present. She also partners with out-of-state journalists to film and interview clients who live elsewhere. The requests are coming in so fast that bookings are filled months in advance.

But regardless of the size or scope of her operation, the focus must remain on the person being memorialized, which is why Ferrara doesn’t appear in the videos unless specifically requested by the client.

But doesn’t making video after video about dying people become a burden? Doesn’t discussing mortality begin to hurt? 

“Yes, at times,” Ferrara admitted. “But more often I leave with my face hurting from laughing so much. Most folks tend to recall amusing stories about their lives, so we laugh together. So often the little stuff is the big stuff in the end. The stories people tell are the small moments in life. Not the weddings or the big careers, but a particularly memorable picnic or family vacation.”

Sometimes they cry together, too. According to Ferrara, it’s those fun-filled triumphs and painful tragedies that make a life worth living—and recording. While the majority of calls Ferrara gets for the recording services are to memorialize older or terminally ill folks, Why Wait is also available to document other events, such as birthdays and weddings. 

For more information on Why Wait Stories, contact Ferrara at the Why Wait Stories website or call 719-291-6967.