Going Forward

I just finished reading Nobody Will Tell You This But Me:  A true (as told to me) story, by Bess Kalb. It is a memoir about mothers and daughters, growing up female, love, and survival. It is a story about escaping from the pogroms in Russia, a twelve-year-old girl’s journey alone to America, and the author’s shattering loss of her beloved grandmother. Filled with her grandmother’s humor and wisdom, Kalb shares her grandmother’s advice on everything from lipstick, to careers, to marriage. But the advice that spoke to me was what her grandmother had learned from her own Zayde, or grandfather, “…when the earth is cracking behind your feet, you go forward. One foot in front of the other. One foot in front of the other.”

I saw a tweet the other day from an extraordinary leader, Dr. Pam Eddinger, President of Bunker Hill Community College in Boston. “Crowdsourcing solutions for community college president bone-wrecking fatigue syndrome. Ugh. I am NOT getting off this couch.”  I couldn’t think of anything to say to Pam, because I am not confronting the day-to-day leadership challenges COVID-19 has added to her burdens. And yet I can relate to the fatigue. I would describe mine as soul-crushing. How many times must I defend the values I believe in, like women’s equality, against deceitful, vicious attacks? The death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg and the nomination of her antithesis has been discouraging in the truest sense of the word. My courage is failing.  

 Zayde’s advice is perfect for these times. “I’ll say it again, I don’t care if you’ve heard it a thousand times, Kalb’s grandmother says, “…you keep walking forward.” I have heard this advice time and time again. However, like Pam, today is my day for not getting off the couch, for retreating, if only briefly, to give my body and soul a chance to heal. Tomorrow I’ll start going forward again.