Dear Bob,

I want to express profound gratitude for your chosen mission of sharing your life experience and substance abuse message with teenagers.

When the halls are silent as students emerge from your presentation.  When they stand wordlessly in twos and threes, some with tears in their eyes. When, in the small groups that meet frequently afterward, students eagerly ask questions and listen in rapt attention to the answers, I know they have been deeply touched.

   

This is not about signs and symptoms. Kids know much about that. It is about a vulnerable human being speaking his truth simply and authentically, with humor, poetry and music, things kids relate to at a gut level. I believe in that moment of decision whether to drink and drive, yours is the kind of message that gives young people pause to value their own life and the lives of their friends.

I am honored you have chosen to use the last picture ever taken of Julie for emphasis in your moving and up-beat presentation. My daughter’s sweet seventeen year old face, in the red sweater leaning against a tree, is the face of those who have yet to make this life-changing choice.