In this chapter, Roger Simon discusses the possibilities of public history as a site for ethical learning. He wants remembrance to be understood as a burdensome gift in which the public must learn to respond to the gift in a relational and just way. He suggests that to live relationally in the present with and for the past, it is important to ask questions and listen “as if the lives of others really matter.” While this chapter diverges from the majority of historical consciousness theory found within the Theorizing Historical Consciousness collection, it teases out a different reading of historical consciousness and the possibilities for being historically conscious.