In Thorton Wilder's "Our Town", universal human themes are explored by looking at the daily lives of the citizens of Grover's Corners, an imaginary location in New Hampshire which Wilder uses to represent the average American small town. Through witnessing the everyday occurences of common people much like ourselves and those we know, we become more aware of what we've always sensed about life, but which has often been swept under the rug by our own business and daily concerns. Rather than using esoteric and foreign concepts to communicate his ideas, Wilder more effectively speaks to us in a language that we all understand, that exists at the most practical level of our existence: the daily events that repeat themselves over and over throughout our lives.
Wilder also recognizes that there is a higher value to these repetitious actions than many of us understand. Eating breakfast with one's family, going off to school, reading a newspaper...
Wild dog
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Wild grassthese are the events that truly compose our lives. We overlook them because we see them as ordinary and disposable, something that has happened countless times before and will happen countless times again, and we put our attention on other things, on something in the future or elsewhere that seems more exciting, letting the most precious minutes of our lives slip away with barely an acknowledgement. In doing so we ignore what is essentially our lives. Wilder's message is that these everyday things are not disposable, they do not last forever, there is an end, and because of this we need to appreciate every moment we are given as a precious gift. If we cannot recognize the value of every second, if we take our time for granted and fail to realize its significance and limitedness, then we are doomed to never...