With such thoughts, I invite you the reader to embark on a new journey. In the following passages you will meet new friends and renew old acquaintances. Shared experiences, as a representation of the primacy of our lives, make for smooth renewals and new intimates. For the once disconnected, the writers give strength to explore heritage, to define roots and inspiration to fight for social justice and equity. Within, your persona will be nurtured, refuged, and sanctuaried. In The Road Less Travelled, Peck defines love as “the will to extend one's self for the purpose of nurturing one's own or another's spiritual growth.” Santayana said, “One's friends are that part of the human race with which one can be human.” This is a human book. Writing and reading are evolutionary acts beyond our ego boundaries, whereby, through reciprocal acts of caring and nurturing, we construct human kind.—From the introduction by Don Fiddler