Off the Sidelines

by Kirsten Gillibrand

  Two days after that I visited a relief area on Coney Island, staged by FEMA with the help of the New York City Department of Health. This site, in the parking lot adjacent to the Brooklyn Cyclones baseball stadium, had tents, food, and communications equipment—but they, too, had hundreds of bags of unsorted donations. Meanwhile, lines of people waiting for coats, gloves, sweaters, blankets, food, and toiletries snaked out in all directions, and the queues kept stalling and growing longer, as the supply of jackets and blankets on hand for volunteers to dispense kept running low.

  I walked over to the undifferentiated donation pile and started sorting, searching for coats and blankets. This wasn’t much, but at least it was something. I convinced a few other people to join me and we all got to work, organizing piles of jackets and other warm items and delivering them to the volunteers to give away. Nobody deputized me to do this, and, to be honest, I’m not sure if it fit into the New York City health department’s overall plan. But I hated standing around, useless. I hoped at least a few more families were warm that night.

  For weeks after Sandy, I was depressed. I woke up every day with an empty feeling in the pit of my stomach, which stemmed from my inability to do nearly enough. Again and again, I’d tell Jonathan how awful and ineffective I felt, and he’d encourage me to hang in there. But I was breaking down—not eating right, skipping meals—and I could not keep my mind focused on anything positive. It kept drifting back to all the pain and devastation. In Westchester County, two boys were killed when a tree fell through the roof of a house. Twenty people in New York State drowned in their own homes. I couldn’t fathom all the suffering; I felt unhinged even trying. Theoretically, at least, I held a position of power, yet I couldn’t do anything of consequence. I dwelled on that for weeks.

  Soon enough I realized that my energy was best spent fighting for money and resources for my constituents, so I began asking every senator I could for help. Senator Daniel Inouye, chairman of the Appropriations Committee, had seen many disasters in his time. He knew how useless I was feeling. “I know how devastating it is; I will help,” he said, wise as always. I held on to his words. The bill to bring $60 billion of disaster aid to Sandy victims was the last Inouye ever wrote. Sadly, he died six weeks before it passed.

  I also found purpose in testifying before my colleagues, telling the story of Glenda Moore and her two lost sons. I wanted to put a human face to the tragedy in a way that nobody had yet done. The morning of the testimony, I was so preoccupied that I just pulled my hair back in a clip and didn’t bother to put on makeup. (I only wear makeup when I know I’ll be photographed; the rest of the time, I’m barefaced.) So I looked exactly as wrung out as I felt when I told the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works about Brendan and Connor Moore. Typically that committee hears testimony about infrastructure—not very emotional stuff. During my testimony I lost my composure and cried openly, and I didn’t care. I was focused on what I’d learned from Mary Landrieu in my fights for the 9/11 healthcare bill and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell. A two-year-old boy and a four-year-old boy had died. My objective was to tell the story of the pain and needs of people whose lives were devastated by the storm.

  Thankfully, most of the time, life is less heart-wrenching, and a small measure of kindness can feel significant or at least boost somebody’s day.

  A couple of years ago, I watched a colleague fight like hell to win her reelection race. She was up against a self-funder who was spending a fortune on attack ads. The stress was causing her to lose so much weight so quickly that her suits sagged off her shoulders and hips. So I decided to buy her a little pick-me-up: a cute but professional pantsuit and matching blouse. (I’ve gotten pretty good at guessing sizes over the years.) One day, during votes, I led her into the private reception room off the Senate floor. “Just a present for your campaign,” I said. “I know you don’t have a minute for yourself.”

  She texted me right after she tried it on, thanking me and saying she was now ready to go out “and beat this guy!” She wore it to her next debate.

  In my office, we help in more substantial and satisfying small ways. Most hours of most days, I’m not writing a new law or changing the world. I’m doing little tangible things—helping where I can by, say, making phone calls for people who are having trouble navigating the bureaucracy that stands between them and a green card or citizenship. My immigration team is so good at working the system. They know exactly whom to call, and when, and what needs to be said so the small important things happen, like somebody’s grandmother attending a wedding or a child who is in the United States on a limited visa making it home for a family funeral.

  Similarly, the small kindnesses people extend to me mean so much. I will never forget what Senator Dianne Feinstein did for me my first month in the Senate. She invited me to lunch and asked me if I might want some tips on managing my workload and keeping tabs on the hundreds of issues that crop up each week in a big state like New York. I said, “Yes, of course!” so she walked me through all the reports and updates she receives from her staff, explaining which ones she gets daily, which ones she gets weekly, how she keeps track of who’s calling her office about what issues, where her legislation stands, and what her staff are working on. She even handed me her actual summary report—the weekly one—so I could study it in precise detail. This was a huge gift. She’d created her system through decades of trial, error, and careful consideration. I felt like I’d been handed the secret recipe for Coke or Pepsi! Dianne knew I was probably drowning in my new job. She offered me not just a rope, but a canoe with paddles.

  The list of those who’ve helped me is long. One simple but life-changing example: A coach from Theo’s baseball team—who’s also the father of one of the players—regularly drives Theo home after practice. He must know that I feel awkward asking, because now he just offers, and his thoughtful gesture takes a huge weight off my mind. Theo’s practice ends at 8:00 P.M., so if I pick him up myself, Henry has to come in the car, and that keeps him up past his bedtime.

  I try to pay it forward. In February 2012, a young woman named Tulsi Gabbard, who was running for Congress from the 2nd district of Hawaii, reached out to me. She’d entered the primary race six months earlier with little name recognition, and was still 45 percentage points behind the Democratic front-runner. But I believed in her. After 9/11 she’d volunteered to serve in Iraq. She then did a second tour in Kuwait, where her job was to train the all-male Kuwaiti National Guard. On her first day, many of the guardsmen refused to shake her hand or acknowledge her existence, but when they graduated, the men honored Tulsi with an award for her work. The day I met Tulsi I said to her, “We’ve got to get you to Congress so we can work together!” and I meant it, too. We need leaders like Tulsi, and I’d been where she was: a rookie nobody knew, far behind in my first race. I tapped into my network, reaching thousands of women and men dedicated to supporting good women candidates. And guess what? Tulsi won. She earned her own success, charging into a tough campaign and putting in all the hard work required to win. Tulsi is now the first Hindu member of Congress and the lead House sponsor of our bill to combat military sexual assault. (And she’s a clutch player on our softball team!)

  In my school community, I make a point of inviting two or three extra boys to the movies on a Saturday so their parents can go out on a date, or I walk a half dozen kids to their computer class when I walk Theo. At home, I try to make time for the details. Cooking Theo his favorite breaded chicken, finding the preferred soccer shorts again, playing Candy Land over and over, reading every Berenstain Bears book … Life happens in these small moments. They’re often where the important lessons present themselves and the big truths emerge.

  In my house, a significant part of the parenting job is listening to and decoding the myriad hurts, hopes, slights, and concerns Henry and Theo present me with each day. For instance, whenever Theo is complaining about feeling vaguely bad, I know he’s not really sick. When he’s sick, he’s very
specific. When his symptoms are amorphous, something happened at school. Often it’ll take me more than twenty questions to dig out the root cause, because Theo is my reticent kid. But eventually he opens up and explains that he got in trouble for distracting a classmate when they both should have been listening, or a friend called him crazy when he was trying to be funny. Henry, on the other hand, is not shy. Far from it. His challenge is that he’s all emotion. With him I have to wade through the soup of his feelings to find the solid issue underneath.

  For example, just this morning Theo had a fever—a real one. He told me he was hot, and sure enough he was, so he had to stay home from school. Then Henry wanted to stay home, too, so he tried to fake sick.

  First he said, “Mommy, I don’t feel so good. I have a headache.”

  I said, “Well, try to go to school anyway and tough it out.”

  A minute later Henry said, “I feel like I have to throw up.”

  “If you throw up, I’ll collect you from school and bring you to my office and you can throw up on Theo there.”

  Henry didn’t get my joke, but he did finally come to his point. “I think you care more about Theo, because he gets to stay home!”

  I’m sure you’ve been there: late, rushing to get out the door, when something profound comes into relief. I put down my bag, bent to Henry’s level, and held him. “I love you very much,” I said, “and we’ll plan a ‘Mommy and Henry’ day soon. But sick days aren’t fun. You’ll have more fun at school than sitting in my office, doing nothing.”

  Henry glared at me; then he let it drop. Digging to the bottom of how someone feels is essential—at home, at work, everywhere. Henry did get his “Mommy and Henry” time later that week. While Theo was on a playdate, Henry and I spent the morning having brunch, getting his hair cut, buying him a new shirt for a special family dinner that night, and then he sat on my lap while I got a pedicure. I felt so blessed to have a day alone with him. Nothing consequential happened, and that’s what made it perfect. My work life has plenty of drama. At home I try to focus on peace, love, and heart.

  Chapter 10

  My Real Inner Circle

  One Sunday in December 2011, after waking up early, kissing my boys goodbye, catching a 9:44 A.M. flight from Reagan airport to Newark, speaking at a women’s fundraiser in New Jersey, holding a press conference in midtown Manhattan, interviewing a candidate in my New York City office for a community-outreach position, and attending a lunch for State Senate Democrats, I escaped to my friend Angela’s house on the Upper East Side.

  I don’t think I have ever been so happy to walk through a friend’s door.

  I knew in advance that the day was going to be long (and it was far from over—I still had a finance meeting and a fundraising dinner to attend). But I clung to the saving grace on my itinerary, a single line toward the bottom of the page: “2:30 P.M. to 4:30 P.M., Personal time.”

  “Personal time” on my schedule can mean many things: a doctor’s appointment, a concert at school, a squash match. But that Sunday it meant visiting Angela. The two of us had bonded over a thousand late nights during my years at Davis Polk.

  The minute I walked into her apartment, I felt a wave of relief. You know what I’m talking about, that letting go that comes from the bone-deep comfort of being understood and unconditionally loved, knowing you can let your guard all the way down? I tossed my suit jacket, kicked off my shoes, and sat on a kitchen stool as Angela, five foot two with a smile that lights up a room, piled dishes in the sink from her children’s late lunch. Her life is exactly as hectic as mine. She’s now a partner at Davis Polk and she has two kids under five, which means she never has enough time to exercise, or be by herself or alone with her husband, or read a book for fun, or just exhale. But in spite of that—and because of it, too—we’ve always made time for our friendship. Friendship is the glue that holds me and all the parts of my life together.

  We didn’t talk about anything important that day—no cases, no elections, no sick parents, no pregnancies, no angst about our kids. Just the silly complaints we never get to share: how all that our British husbands want to do is go away for the weekend and race cars, how those husbands expect us to be parenting savants, how miserable grueling diets are. Angela had recently lost ten pounds, so she was down to a size four while I was back up to a six. I’d made a point of bringing a suitcase of suits and dresses for her to try on. Some of them I’d barely worn; others I shouldn’t have bought in the first place. My girlfriends and I have always shared clothes. Angela pulled out for me some clothes that didn’t fit her just then, including a red-and-black strapless Burberry dress that Jonathan had bought me pre-babies, which was now coming full-circle from my closet to Angela’s closet back to mine. Sometimes a borrowed dress is exactly the boost you need.

  Just as some men trade power tools, my girlfriends and I trade clothes. Since I started losing weight in 2010, I’ve borrowed tennis whites from my sister-in-law, Liz, and work clothes from my friend Rachel. Even Rachel’s sister gave me some hand-me-downs, which was a real gift, as she has fabulous taste and exactly the kind of elegant but serious outfits I need for work. Over the past five years, I’ve been every size from four to sixteen. Who can afford seven full wardrobes? I happily give away anything that I can’t use. (When I was losing weight, I purposefully gave away my old smaller dresses. I liked the reward of buying new clothes when I dropped a size.) I even give my old work suits to my female staff. My general counsel, Michele Jawando, who’s had three pregnancies, has made good use of whatever size fits her at the moment; the others take the rest. Jess often looks bewildered when he sees a junior staffer walking around in a blazer he’s sure he’s seen on me.

  Before I left Angela’s house that Sunday, I promised to send her a beaded dress that I bought when I was single but hadn’t put on in years. We also made a plan for New Year’s Eve so we could get together and wear our “new” elegant outfits. Then I was shot back out the door, into my finance meeting and my work dinner, the reality of my daily life.

  Women talk a lot about juggling work and family, and it’s a crucial conversation. But for me, the third leg of the stool, the one that keeps my life from toppling over, is friendship. It’s a choice, not a responsibility. It’s my respite from demands, the place I go to recharge myself so I have energy for all the rest: raising my children, nurturing my marriage, serving my constituents to the best of my ability, and caring for my extended family.

  I travel a lot, but I have final control over my schedule, so I try to squeeze in visits with friends as often as I can. Sometimes it’s just twenty minutes (and if I’m lucky, an hour or two) in Albany, Los Angeles, Denver, or London. Even a short check-in can keep me sane, especially when I’m feeling stretched too thin. My childhood friend Elaine once threw a birthday dinner party for me because I was too busy to plan anything and she knew I’d be depressed if December 9 rolled around and I was working yet again. Paige, who I’ve known since high school, more than once invited my family over for Halloween because our house in Hudson was too rural for Theo and Henry to trick-or-treat door-to-door when they were very young. Caroline and Jennifer always find time for weekend summer barbecues.

  My childhood friends have kept me centered more times than I can count. During my run for Congress in 2008, before my big debate with Sandy Treadwell, Elaine and Paige joined me back in the green room with snacks, because they know everything about me, including the fact that I get anxious, short-tempered, and unreasonable when I’m hungry. They joked with me about the absurd parts of the campaign to settle my nerves. Then they checked my teeth before I went onstage.

  Being there for them means just as much. If one of my friends has a major life event, I do anything within my power to attend, even if it means planning my schedule six or nine months in advance. When my friend Alisandra asked me to be her daughter’s godmother, I made sure I was in Los Angeles for the christening, just as I was sure to be in New York City for Lucy’s daughters, in London
for Gillian’s son, and in Albany for all of Erin’s kids. My girlfriends and I have held one another’s hands through breakups and pre-wedding jitters, including hair and makeup crises that felt insurmountable at the time. We’ve absorbed all the bitching about swollen ankles and aching backs that come with pregnancies. And of course we’ve been there for one another in the hard moments, too. When Elaine needed someone to take care of her children for the day so she could move her mother, who was suffering with Alzheimer’s, into an assisted-living facility, there was nowhere else I would have been.

  Like too many working women with young families, I’ve had to rely on my children to help me make new friends in this phase of my life. I just don’t have a spare second to meet new people and to build relationships from scratch. I’ve now spent two Valentine’s Day dinners with Stephanie, a mom from Theo’s school, the mother of his friend Wilson. (I must say Theo has excellent taste in friends.) Both our husbands travel a lot and were out of town, so the first Valentine’s Day that we spent together with the boys, I cooked steak and vegetables, and we ladies shared a nice bottle of wine. The second, we planned to meet at La Loma, a local Mexican restaurant. That night turned into a bit of a fiasco, as La Loma has three locations (two related La Lomitas), and each of our families went to a different one, and my phone battery died from Henry playing too much Plants vs. Zombies. But we all met up, ordered lots of carne asada (no nachos—we were both on low-carb diets), and had a laugh.

  Political friendships are different from personal ones, but they provide balance and warmth, as well. I say this in interviews a lot, but I think it bears repeating: One of the reasons why women in Congress have been so effective is that we actually know and like one another. In April 2009, my friend Debbie Wasserman Schultz organized a women’s congressional softball team. The prior year, she’d been diagnosed with breast cancer. She didn’t tell any of us on Capitol Hill about her illness until she’d recovered from her double mastectomy. But when she returned to work, she filled us in and asked if we would join a team to raise money for breast-cancer awareness among young women. I had never played softball. I didn’t know the first thing about the game, and I was in terrible shape, still nursing Henry and having just started playing tennis again. But I jumped at the chance to play. Only one member of our team was under forty; the median age was well over fifty. We represented profoundly different districts. I was thrilled.