The letters and journals a person leaves are among the most intimate forms of legacy — unguarded, private, never meant for the eyes now reading them, or sometimes written specifically with those future eyes in mind. They offer access to the inner life that most other legacy forms cannot provide: the doubt, the humor, the private grief, the unresolved questions. They also raise the question of what their author would have wanted, which only the living can decide.
Each step builds on the last.