As teenagers my brother and I enjoyed reading novels and I remember when we studied Thorton Wilder in class. I found books by this author, and many more, in Johnny’s room after he passed.

I reviewed Wilder’s line in “The Bridge of San Luis Rey” which says “there is a land of the living and a land of the dead, and the bridge is love, the only survival, the only meaning.” I felt that Johnny was talking to me. We also learned in that awesome class that there was another symbolic bridge that connects where humanity began and where it might go. We must work to make life better for those who come after.