MARK SCHUMANN

Biking across the Alma Lee Loy Bridge this morning, I stopped at the memorial for Cole Coppola.  Just three words said all that can be said about a young man who is now so greatly missed.

The roadside memorial to Cole made me think of an experience my wife, Cheri, and I had recently hiking at Ghost Ranch, New Mexico.  At the end of the long, steep trek up to Chimney Rock you can look south beyond Lake Abiquiu for what seems like infinity.

There above the expansive, enchanting landscape of northern New Mexico, Cheri and I came upon a middle aged man who was writing a message on the flat side of a burnt orange rock, a rock which he then carefully placed in the shade beneath a sage brush. What the man had written was a poignant memorial to his son, who died at the age of 21.  “Go for the unconditional love,” the father wrote, “for nothing else matters.”