Marian Fontana, author and founder of the 9/11 Families Association, delivered the commencement address at the Massachusetts School of Law in 2006. Her husband Dave, a firefighter, had died on September 11, 2001, running into the towers to save lives. The world called Dave a hero for that act, but Fontana offered a different definition of heroism: the small daily kindnesses — smiling at people when they passed, pulling the neighborhood kids in her son's wagon, always holding the door open, overtipping the waitress. Fontana's redefinition of success was rooted in grief's brutal clarity. Loss strips away the superficial metrics of achievement and reveals what actually matters. She urged the graduating law students to notice the small moments of their lives — on their way to the courtroom, the office, wherever their careers would lead — because those moments are what we carry with us and what we mourn when they are gone.