When a link saves a life

A story brought me to tears last week.

A seemingly innocuous assignment to fill a blank space on page 6 of the Feb. 17 Low Down turned into a 152-word brief that shook me (“Chelsea women’s shelter gets $13,000”).

Like any brief, it started with a press release. Usually briefs are less than 250 words, don’t require lengthy interviews and can be slapped together in less than 20 minutes. This was different.

The story? A local politician announced $13,000 in federal funding for the women's shelter in Chelsea, Maison Libère-Elles. Good news, right? Yes, of course.

But it wasn’t the press release or the writing of the story that wa