Letters to the Past

In her blog Katherine Chipman mentioned the idea of writing letters to those in the past, and after reading Cicero's Letter One and Cicero's Letter Two I have completely fallen in love with the idea, and as Katherine said what we could gain from the experience. Petrarch's letters address a long-dead Cicero and praise him for his influence on humanism, and Roman thought, as well as report to Cicero on the state of Rome. I mentioned in Katherine's blog the idea of writing to the Founding Fathers and what they would have to say about the state of America today, but I was also thinking of ordinary people that are 20, 50, 100 or more years dead, and what sort of changes would they react to not only in America, but throughout the world as it has changed. Are we a place completely foreign to our ancestors, and, in the spirit of American Heritage here at BYU, do we care what they think, do they are their legacy matter to us, should they? Contemplate that as you microwave your oatmeal on your way to your hybrid car while talking on your cellphone and facebooking the world.