Cara brought so much joy, love, and perspective to our family, and her life continues to shape the way I think about what matters most. She remains at the heart of our family story — not defined by losing her, but by everything she taught us and what we learned through the experience. Rewriting my ethical will after Cara’s death is when I understood what the document was actually for. It wasn’t a backup plan. It was the only place resilience, gratitude, and presence could be passed down in my own words — instead of secondhand, through someone else’s account of who I was or from someone’s fading memories.
Families spend years planning how wealth will pass from one generation to the next. We work with attorneys, advisors, and tax professionals to think carefully about what we will leave to our loved ones. We invest enormous resources in transferring financial assets — and almost nothing in transferring the values and experiences that gave that wealth its purpose.
