The play begins with Emily as a young girl in school and ends several years later with her dying in childbirth and entering eternity. Explain two or...

Emily learns the most valuable lessons about
life after her life is over. In the third act of the play, Emily interacts with other dead from
her town, as she watches her family mourn her at her funeral. The other, more experienced dead
try to advise her to let go of her earthly life but she is not ready yet. Emily wants to visit a
moment in her life to interact with her family one last time; the other dead warn her against
this, but she does it anyway. She goes back to a somewhat ordinary birthday from her childhood.
Emily is overwhelmed with emotion and comes to the realization that people never truly
appreciate the moments of their lives while they are living them. Emily famously exclaims,
"Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it?every, every minute?" The
Stage Manager replies, "No." This lesson seems to be a harsh one because it appears
that people can do nothing to change this while alive; they can only learn this after
death.

When visiting her past life, Emily also concludes that life "goes
so fast" and urges her family members to "look at one another." She sees now that
people don't really appreciate each other when they see each other each day. They take each
other for granted. But once you lose a family member, you finally understand how much you mean
to one another. These lessons come too late, of course. Wilder, though, presents the lessons
Emily learns as part of the life cycle, and as lessons that can only be learned after one's life
has ended.