There is a piece of advice I once wrote about playing small parts on a stage (which is all I've done this life around): you cannot think that all you are is a piece of furniture, or you'll end up looking like one. No matter what your role is, you are present on the stage. You must pay attention, and feel your own presence. No matter how small the part, you are not just a fixture, you are the play.

 

It's the same about any life. Life is a great experience to those who perceive it as fully theirs. No matter who you were, no matter who you are, what will be remembered in the future are the parts when you are most aware, most present, most caught up in life.

 

Most of the people on these pages will tell you, by our past life memories, that it was not the fame we most remember, but the personal things that made us feel most alive. This man's pride at being part of an historic moment was a personal thing that made him feel like a king. The thing I remember most about being Shakespeare is the love I felt for the people around me, even when love seemed bitterest. I still love some of those same people, proving that, sometimes, love truly "alters not with its brief hours and weeks, but bears it out, even to the edge of doom." SS