We Struggle for Hope

Early June 14th - preparing to celebrate our Big Beautiful Multicultural Democracy…

Last weekend began well. We joined dear friends at the annual Humphrey-Mondale dinner and were inspired by the stories we heard of those committed to public service who worked hard to move forward the interests of the constituencies they served. 

Both my husband and I spent parts of our working lives walking the halls of the Capitol building in St. Paul, so we saw some old familiar faces in the room. I pointed out one State Senator, remarking he hadn’t aged at all. He was hugging a younger female colleague, and when she turned around, my husband asked who she was. 

“Oh, that’s Melissa Hortman,” I said. “She was the House Speaker who this session is sharing leadership with her Republican colleague in a remarkable show of collaboration.”

I knew Melissa because I had the privilege of moderating a webinar she delivered to the University of Minnesota’s retirees last year. She had taken time from the start of the legislative session to speak with our group of old faculty, staff, and administrators who remain interested and engaged in civic affairs. 

She was remarkable with her responses to the pertinent - and some impertinent - questions of my colleagues. I shared how impressed I had been with her quiet competence, her balanced approach to compromise, and her clear concern for the community she served. She was measured and pragmatic. And also a strong advocate for fairness in civil rights and for comprehensive reproductive health care.

We left that evening feeling uplifted. 

I woke up to a list of tasks to complete as we prepared for our Clowns & Tacos Celebration of Our Big Beautiful Multicultural Democracy on our lawn. It was designed to offer space for those who were either too young or too old to go to the rallies planned throughout the greater Twin Cities area. The bouncy house was on its way, and my friendly Lorenzo asked if we wanted more chips for our Taco Bar. 

And then the news started popping up, as it now does on our ubiquitous devices. First a notice of shootings in the northern suburbs, and a note to shelter in place. We live in the southwest corner of the Cities, so I didn’t pay much mind. 

Then a text came from a friend saying Melissa had been shot, followed quickly by the next saying she and her husband had been murdered, that another senator had been shot, and the madman was still on the loose. 

Within the hour, notices were flying to avoid public gatherings as sporadic details emerged of the horror that had taken place overnight. 
Friends called and texted asking if we were still gathering. My gut said that we needed community more than ever, and our neighborhood gathering wasn’t on anyone’s list. So we moved forward.

Some stayed home. Some changed plans and boldly went to the Capitol in a show of surprising strength. Rallies continued, and we now know the madman was hiding and running and ended up in a field where trail cameras picked him up about 48 hours after his first bullets killed Melissa.

We had close to fifty people on the porch and on the lawn, reconnecting with old friends and meeting new neighbors. It was precisely what this country is all about - friendly people who may not agree about the latest road construction project, but who can discuss and resolve their concerns over a taco. 

The anxiety and horror of what was unfolding over the day was also on the lawn. Lots of discussion about what we do in the face of this madness. What can we do?

By midweek, one of the many legacies of the Hortmans - their children - provided an answer. You may have seen this - but it deserves repeating as often as possible.

“We are devastated and heartbroken at the loss of our parents, Melissa and Mark. They were the bright lights at the center of our lives, and we can’t believe they are gone. Their love for us was boundless. We miss them so much.

“We want everyone to know that we are both safe and with loved ones. We are grateful for the outpouring of love and support we have received, and we appreciate your respect for our family’s privacy as we grieve.

“Our family would like to thank law enforcement for their swift action that saved others and for the coordination across communities that led to the arrest of the man who murdered our parents. We especially would like to thank the officers who were first on the scene to our parents’ home and their heroic attempts to rescue our mom and dad.

“Our parents touched so many lives, and they leave behind an incredible legacy of dedication to their community that will live on in us, their friends, their colleagues and co-workers, and every single person who knew and loved them.

“If you would like to honor the memory of Mark and Melissa, please consider the following:

• Plant a tree

• Visit a local park and make use of their amenities, especially a bike trail.

• Pet a dog. A golden retriever is ideal, but any will do.

• Tell your loved ones a cheesy dad joke and laugh about it.

• Bake something - bread for Mark or a cake for Melissa, and share it with someone.

• Try a new hobby and enjoy learning something.

• Stand up for what you believe in, especially if that thing is justice and peace.

  “Hope and resilience are the enemy of fear. Our parents lived their lives with immense dedication to their fellow humans. This tragedy must become a moment for us to come together. Hold your loved ones a little closer. Love your neighbors. Treat each other with kindness and respect. The best way to honor our parents’ memory is to do something, whether big or small, to make our community just a little better for someone else.”

  And that, my friends, is a challenge to all of us. To push away the anger that breeds evil with a commitment to hold to resilient hope and care for our fellow humans.

Swain's Send Off

Cover of Tom Swain’s auto/biography written with friend Lori Sturdevant - a powerful read.

It takes something pretty special to get me to leave the comfortable haven of my home porch on a perfect early summer morning before the second cup of coffee. Tom Swain was that something special today.

His community of family and friends gathered to celebrate Tom and his remarkable life in one of his favorite places on the University of Minnesota campus. This send off wasn’t some random slapdash program thrown together at the last minute. No sireee.

Tom began planning for his send off when he was 95. And that was in 2017. By the time he ended his last chapter this year, there had been eight years of phone calls and notes with his pre-selected eulogists - so all were well prepared to honor the man who made the most of every moment of his remarkable 103 years on this planet of ours.

I met Tom when he was in his early eighties, so I only knew him for 20 years or so. He had been called back to advise the University president on the public relations and public affairs functions of the Big U, as we call it. That was his third or fourth engagement in institutional relations for his Alma mater - he was a stalwart supporter of our state’s only public research university, and always game to lend his knowledge to the U.

As one of the PR people on campus, I was called to a meeting over in the administration building to meet with this presidential advisor. I remember thinking it was just silly to imagine a well-seasoned 80+ year old would have his finger on the pulse of 21st Century tools and tactics to influence constituencies or audiences, as we call them

Boy, was I wrong. Tom Swain was the consummate connector and he understood people and what made them tick. He listened in order to understand and spoke in order to clarify or to carefully guide colleagues so that his ideas became their ideas. He understood that trust is built carefully and slowly, and can be lost quickly if one violates shared values. He was a man of integrity who cared deeply about any issue or cause he championed. 

Swain didn’t need to deploy social media or targeted placements. He was a master at engaging the people around him to deliver their best work on behalf of the goals of the institution. Whether that involved media relations, government relations, or community relations, his mastery of the relations part of the equation gave all around him the permission to engage effectively with either the media, government, or community with tools available. 

I learned a lot from Tom Swain, as did the hundreds of his family and friends who gathered for today’s send off. And perhaps most poignantly for all of us who now sport stunningly silver hair - we learned that one is never too old to take on another challenge or a good risk, as demonstrated by our friend Swain.

The Serendipity of Friends

The Linden Hills neighborhood kids all grown up (with one grandkid added) - the Koppel kids, one Liddy kid, and the Cooney kids back on the block.

I’ve spent more than a week surrounded by close friends, both here at home and at a beach house in South Carolina. And that’s led to deep pondering about friendships and how they come to be.

A week ago, we gathered with an array of former neighbors as well as the adult version of the former kids of the neighborhood to celebrate the life of our friend Sheree Cooney. The greetings and hugs and memories and laughs and tears spanned nearly 20 hours and two events. We welcomed friends from around the country - all returning to honor our connection to Sheree.

Most of the stories we shared were highly appropriate. But not all. That wouldn’t have been true to the feisty woman who was Sheree.  

We knew nothing about this neighborhood when we signed a short term lease for a house at the end of 1990. We just thought the house was cute and near a couple of lakes, and how bad could that be? Turns out the serendipity of that decision landed us in the midst of a true village that helped us raise our kids with the nurturing of good friends - like Sheree. And those serendipitous friends remain dear today. 

The rest of the week was spent with a group of my college roommates. What could be more random than the array of 18 year olds who show up on a Freshman hall in North Carolina? Yet among those women - plus a few from the other three years - are some of my closest friends today. We’ve shared experiences of first jobs, dating, marriages, kids, pets, good health and bad, and now grandchildren. 

We are lucky - again pure serendipity - that we were thrown together in college and have remained close. We started arranging get-togethers nearly 30 years ago, before texting and email made it easy.  Now we have Google shared drives to arrange activities on trips abroad. 

This week was an easy trip to meet up at Myrtle Beach where one of The Girls conveniently purchased a house that is ideal for gathering. We missed one core member who was wrapping up treatment at Duke, but she zoomed in to laugh along with us nonetheless. 

I can only imagine what life would have been without these women, these friends in my life. Less fun for certain. And definitely less meaningful.

Thoughts Over Matzo Balls

We wrapped the eight day observance of Passover on Easter Sunday - once again the monotheistic lunar calendars aligning. But the thoughts of the season continue to live on.

When one is in the process of prepping for Passover, one finds herself with time to reflect on a few of the core themes of the holiday - both slavery and freedom. If you take the requirements or rules of the holiday even moderately seriously, then there’s some hefty cleaning that takes place, along with significant food preparation to greet the holiday. It’s the OG of Spring cleaning with a range of customs or traditions surrounding food.

There are the matzo balls of my father in law - the dense type from Hungary. There are the assorted Moroccan spiced dishes of my mother-in-law’s family from Tangier. And in addition to the 4000 year tradition of telling the story of the Exodus, we use a seder plate from cousins Allegria and Ghimol, made by Moroccan brass craftsmen in 1936. Lots of history - many eras - and that makes my mind wander while I’m cleaning or cooking.

This year, my mind was wrapped around concepts of Freedom - what did it mean to the ancient Hebrews? What did it mean to our cousins who grew up and lived in Tangier from the 1930s through the 1990s, and who commissioned the Seder plate? And what does it mean to us today?

OK - stay with me on this one. 

Those who study ancient history posit that not all of the Hebrews living in slavery in Egypt had the gumption to stand up and leave when Pharaoh finally relented following the final plague wrought by the hand of God through the staff of Moses. I think Charlton Heston’s version in the 1956 film, The Ten Commandments, is still my favorite. 

Most assume that all who got a pass to leave slavery would have quickly packed to go, but historians believe nearly eighty percent of the enslaved Hebrews remained in Egypt. Why is that? 

Perhaps it was preferring the known to the unknown. Sure it’s bad to be a slave, but what’s “out there”? What dangers await us as we walk away from all that’s familiar? 

The twenty percent who sought freedom and were brave enough to leave their homes fueled the stories within the Bible’s Book of Exodus, and we celebrate that bravery even today with songs and stories about tables. Of course, the question for us is would we have been brave enough to leave? To become migrants wandering the desert with little clarity of where we were going and how we would be received once we arrived? 

Is the desire for self-determination, the freedom to live without the literal and perceptual shackles of laws and rules over which one has no input or control enough to push any of us away from the known and comfortable? 

Our cousins in Tangier chose to remain when the city lost its international status and became part of Morocco in 1956. That meant the departure of many of the Europeans who had enjoyed the free port status of the city and a shift to the rule of the King and his ministers. Although the sisters were of Portuguese heritage, they were accustomed to life in this North African city overlooking the Straits of Gibraltar. It was comfortable and familiar and they chose to remain rather than migrate with other family and friends. 

Sitting around our table in 2025, the questions arise again. What is important to us about our freedom today? Which of the freedoms we now take for granted are most important? 

Is it the freedom to speak out and disagree on important issues? Is it the freedom to own a gun? Is it the freedom to gather with whomever we wish and worship as we are called to worship? Is it the freedom to protect our privacy? What type of enslavement today would push us to leave this country? Is it the same circumstances that drove nearly all of our ancestors to migrate to this country in the first place? 

My family arrived on this continent in the 1700s seeking financial opportunities from England, and as mercenaries from Germany. My husband’s family arrived in the 1950s, seeking sanctuary from the European theater of war that had torn apart the world they knew. Both pursuits brought our children’s ancestors to what was known as the land of opportunity for immigrants who were willing to work hard. 

For my ancestors, there were no laws governing an immigrant's process to becoming a citizen until 1790. And by then, all had passed the two year threshold of living in this country - and they were white - so they automatically qualified to become citizens. For my husband’s family, the rules required five years of residency - not even continuous - just a total of five years in order to apply to become a citizen. Done and done.

Today we watch immigration becoming a lucrative business. Whether running from or running to, America has been a beacon for immigrants seeking opportunities. And depending how our culture feels in any one era, we’re either welcoming or contemptuous of newcomers. It may go without saying that we’re in one of our contemptuous phases. 

And that leads to the last pesky questions that remain a distraction - when did this land of immigrants become so angry at immigrants? And why don’t we fix the laws to make immigration a rational and reasonable process once again?  

Choosing Joy

Curly the Cat. Photo courtesy of Tim Schacker.

A week ago, the brain tumor came out. Home by the weekend, our friend was calling, texting, and FaceTiming with all of us to share stories of her experience. She generated a lot of laughter with the tales.

“Check it out,” she said to one of us, as she pulled back her hair. “The surgeon did a great job keeping the scar behind my hairline.” She was right. 

This week, she went to her hairdresser with the admonition that she could “baste the surgery site, just not marinate” - meaning she could wash her hair but not soak. She was sporting a lovely new haircut on our weekly zoom call with a new side part showing no evidence that a surgeon had been at work just a week ago. 

Also this week, there are wildfires raging not too far from her place.

“It’s OK,” she says. “We have good insurance.” 

Our friend is the perfect model of choosing to attract joy to her one wonderful life. What a gift she is giving to all of us in this all too chaotic and disturbing era we’re experiencing. 

Joy is indeed a choice. I’ve been accused for years of seeing the glass as half full. 

“You always see the upside in things.” a friend accused me recently. She went on to say that there are problems and issues taking place in this world that need serious attention. That’s absolutely true and I’m committing to doing what I can to tackle those I can influence.

And at the same time, I truly believe we need to grab hold of all the joy we can.

I grew up in a home filled with music, and now I choose my favorite stations so that each floor of the house has tunes eliciting memory as only music can. 

I find joy in preparing meals to share around a table with friends and family. 

I’m plowing through boxes and boxes of my father’s remarkable photographs, and finding joy in sending prints to friends and family far and wide. At this point, I can imagine a few cousins greeting the telltale photo envelope with a shudder. “Not more pictures!” Still sending them.

As we launch into a classic few days of a Minnesota spring, with historic warmth one day followed by snow the next, I’ll seek joy with friends and family around tables with food and games. It’s a choice that’s good for the soul.

An Unexpected Pause

Photo by Steven Mosborg, Mpls

I had been working on a blog about the unraveling of shared values in our country. It was about how we boomers grew up saying the Pledge of Allegiance every morning in grade school, and how the meaning of those words pose a struggle today. 

And then - all of those thoughts were blown away when a dear friend got a tough diagnosis last week. 

I’ve known this friend since my late teens and she has always been one of those souls that remain deeply connected despite the distance of miles and the heavy-lifting  years of early career building and child rearing. So when a persistent headache was found not to be the result of a sinus infection but of a brain tumor, well, all other thought was pushed aside. 

As I’ve learned in the past two years, most diagnoses come after enough friends tell you that what you’re experiencing just isn’t normal or OK. 

She didn’t listen to her husband. We never do, do we? But after her third friend told her she just wasn’t OK, she finally agreed to have a scan just to rule out anything serious. The scan failed to do that, leading to an MRI for more definition. 

And there it was. A brain tumor that had the potential to be a glioblastoma. 
Suddenly - perspectives change. And for her friends, the job was clear.  

Rather than worry with her, we dug deep for the powers of hope and of appealing to higher powers all along the spectrum of belief. This world of ours does deliver miracles, and that’s where we focused. We stopped thinking about what was happening nationally or globally - and focused on what we could anticipate would be helpful for her journey. 

She, on the other hand, tapped into her consistently organized skill set to plan for what she knew and didn’t know was in her future. First things first, she scheduled a manicure and eyebrow wax - it’s important to look good before surgery. She has friends on tab if she needs in-home help. She has her children lined up to be there when she needs them, and made plans for as much as could be known for life post surgery. 

And this week, she had her surgery while her friends around the country experienced a sort of virtual waiting room for updates about outcomes and prognosis. As we waited, we shared stories of memories of exploits with her that were nourishing in their own way. 

The good news is that her brain surgeon is sure he got 99% of the tumor out, and she has all her neurological function in place, including her sense of humor.  She was so engaging with the nurses and staff in the recovery room, she’s sorry she didn’t have her business cards to secure a couple decorating jobs before she was discharged. And she’s already working on new trendy hair styles for whatever follow up treatments will be needed.

I think I’ll exhale for the weekend. The issues of the day can wait while we relish a good medical outcome thanks to science and research that delivers progress for healthcare. 

Feisty Women

My mom’s trusty typewriter got a lot of use - albeit a tad dusty now.

I come from a long line of feisty women. My mom was known for her persistence in writing opinion pieces to the Mansfield News Journal in the 1960s and 70s. When she felt strongly about an issue - and there were many - out came her old Royal typewriter, the onion skin paper, and the carbon paper, as she always kept a copy. 

Her mother was feisty in a different manner. She came to live with us when my mother gave up rescuing her from repeated falls in her hometown a hundred miles away from us. Grandma just wouldn’t give up gardening her large back lot despite those falls. 

And then she persisted in getting on ladders to wash light fixtures in our house, driving Mom to distraction and ultimately, Grandma Blue ended up in the Mansfield Memorial Home where she could be watched full time. Mom was feistier than Grandma.

Turns out my birth mother was feisty as well. She ran away from home to give birth to me rather than marry as her only option in the mid-1950s. Apparently, she’d watched her older sisters marry young and was determined not to remain in the Appalachian coal mining town of her childhood. 

That means both nature and nurture have provided a strong blueprint of action for me.

That feistiness can cause trouble. 

I worked for our Republican congressman in the late 1970s, answering phones and greeting guests who came to his D.C. office. John Ashbrook represented the right wing of the times, running against Richard Nixon in the 1972 Presidential primaries because Nixon wasn’t conservative enough.  

While there, Phyllis Schlafly frequently visited, using the couch across from my desk between meetings where she tested out her advocacy messaging. During one visit, she was promoting the idea that a woman’s role was best served as a wife and mother at home in support of her husband’s ambitions. That women should not aspire to be in the workplace at all.

I just couldn’t help it. 

“Mrs. Schlafly?” I said. 

“Yes, dear,” she politely responded. 

“Aren’t you a wife and mother, m’am?” 

“Why yes, I am,” she smiled. 
“Then why are you out here in D.C. working rather than at home with your children taking care of your household?” 

The smile left her face and I didn’t last long in Ashbrook’s office. 

I did learn a lot, though. I watched smart grown men leave Congressman Ashbrook’s  inner chambers quaking at his screaming and railing at whatever mistake he had found in their reasoning, And that taught me that feisty is one thing. Aggressive bullying behavior is something else. 

And it needs to be called out and condemned always. It’s how this country will ensure that we will retain the core freedom to have all voices heard in public. Even Phyllis Schlafly’s. 

Fairness & Civility

Front entrance of WRC-TV

In the early 1980s, I was a TV producer with the NBC owned and operated station in Washington, DC. I was only there a few years before a job change moved us to Philadelphia, but it was a heady time to be in DC with the advent of the Reagan administration. 

I worked with consumer investigative reporter Lea Thompson and was accountable for up to two minutes of air time a day. We covered topics like food safety, product alerts, and sometimes testing of commercial product claims. One memorable product test was set up to answer the pressing question of which battery truly lasted the longest. We bought novelty eyeglasses with wipers, each powered by a major battery brand, lined them up in a row, and turned them on at the same time to record how long each battery lasted. Important information for consumers, no? Today I have no idea which battery lasted the longest, but I do still buy Duracell. 

It was a very different era for TV news and among the differences was an adherence to the Fairness Doctrine in all of our reporting. The Fairness Doctrine was an FCC rule introduced in 1949 that required any entity holding a broadcast license to present controversial issues of public importance and to do so in a way that fairly reflected differing viewpoints. 

Although I’m not certain how controversial an issue battery life is or was, we were careful and diligent in reaching out to the public relations officers of all those brands we tested for comment to report on their responses in the interest of fairness. 

The Fairness Doctrine also encouraged WRC-TV’s radio station to host a talk program with Tom Braden and Pat Buchanan at our studios. I would frequently encounter Pat Buchanan as he was dropped at the station by his lovely wife, walking in to greet his friend Tom Braden for their radio show. Some of you probably remember Pat Buchanan as one of Nixon’s top aides and a staunch conservative while Tom Braden was a former CIA agent, author of “Eight is Enough”, and an equally staunch liberal. 

Their articulate commitment to opposing viewpoints was balanced by a respectful friendship that allowed them to argue thoughtfully and retain the ability to engage on core shared values. I always learned something by listening to those two men discuss issues of public importance without vitriolic name calling. They were never mean or nasty in their comments. Civil, actually.

I miss that today. The Fairness Doctrine was eliminated in the late 1980s and along with it the idea of fairness on the nation’s airwaves. In its place are stations that preach partisan viewpoints with little balance. 

Once upon a time, people were able to disagree and still engage in civil discourse, to listen carefully to differing viewpoints, and to seek to understand where those differences came from rather than merely deliver canned messaging designed to diminish The Other. I wonder whether that will ever be possible again.