Firefighter and paramedic Sam Gebler gets a glimpse of what lurks beneath the surface of a sunny California afternoon.

As a kid, Nichole Perkins always liked a very specific type of song.

Elna Baker picks up with Jane Marie’s story. Jane Marie is the host of the podcast The Dream.

Brian and Peg disagree over a very important thing. Host Ira Glass tries to figure out who’s right.

Ira goes out birding with birder extraordinaire Noah Strycker, who tells the dramatic story of the bird that changed his life: the turkey vulture.

Pavan Bivigou writes about having sickle-cell anemia.

Our producer, Diane Wu, spent most of her life thinking she doesn’t have a unique and personal take on The Sound of Music. She is wrong.

David Kestenbaum follows one person as they try to find something—a set of words, some facts, a story—to convince Trump Republicans to get themselves vaccinated.

Susan Burton talks to women about why it’s so hard to talk about eating disorders.

Parents try to shape who we are in their own image. Producer Neil Drumming spoke to Adam Mansbach, who tried to make his daughter fall in love with hip-hop.

What does “thank you” actually look like? And who gets one? For Flato Alexander and other essential workers, all sorts of symbols that hadn’t bothered them much before suddenly became unbearable.

Producer Neil Drumming talks with the rapper Breeze Brewin about a toy car they both loved playing with as kids: The General Lee from the hit TV show The Dukes of Hazzard. Breeze went on to record a song called “Generally” about The General Lee with his group the Juggaknots.

We put out a call for embarrassing stories and got back more than 1000.

Because the U.S. doesn’t usually prosecute anyone under 18 for the crime of smuggling people illegally across the border from Mexico, tons of teenagers do it, for money. Reporter Kevin Sieff spent months talking to some of them.

Mohamedou talks to a man he only knew as Mr. X and who still gives him nightmares.