Storytelling is a fundamental part of being human. Our earliest ancestors in the genus Homo emerged in the Great Rift Valley in Africa approximately 2 million years ago/Somewhere within that time span, probably within the last 70,000 to 100,000 years, we gained the ability to speak. Perhaps the main reason we evolved that ability was to tell each other stories, such as the one I am going to tell you about my father, Dr David Cooper, his early death at 48 years old, and how, in the years since, I’ve sought to understand both him and what happened to him.

Storytelling is a fundamental part of being human. Our earliest ancestors in the genus Homo emerged in the Great Rift Valley in Africa approximately 2 million years ago/Somewhere within that time span, probably within the last 70,000 to 100,000 years, we gained the ability to speak. Perhaps the main reason we evolved that ability was to tell each other stories, such as the one I am going to tell you about my father, Dr David Cooper, his early death at 48 years old, and how, in the years since, I’ve sought to understand both him and what happened to him.

Storytelling is a fundamental part of being human. Our earliest ancestors in the genus Homo emerged in the Great Rift Valley in Africa approximately 2 million years ago/Somewhere within that time span, probably within the last 70,000 to 100,000 years, we gained the ability to speak. Perhaps the main reason we evolved that ability was to tell each other stories, such as the one I am going to tell you about my father, Dr David Cooper, his early death at 48 years old, and how, in the years since, I’ve sought to understand both him and what happened to him.

Storytelling is a fundamental part of being human. Our earliest ancestors in the genus Homo emerged in the Great Rift Valley in Africa approximately 2 million years ago/Somewhere within that time span, probably within the last 70,000 to 100,000 years, we gained the ability to speak. Perhaps the main reason we evolved that ability was to tell each other stories, such as the one I am going to tell you about my father, Dr David Cooper, his early death at 48 years old, and how, in the years since, I’ve sought to understand both him and what happened to him.