Dear Joanne,

Though you probably do not know me by name, you would recognize me as a young staffer from the capitol. I have worked in one part of the building or another for over five years now, and first worked full time in the process when you were a freshman Representative. While you might not know me by name, your husband would. I first met him as a staffer for then-Representative Bruce Starr, when you were a member of his Transportation Committee. I was always struck with admiration for Lawton, and it was with deep sadness that I heard of his recent passing.

Sometimes, though not often, you meet someone of a certain crystalline quality, someone who stands a little taller and walks with surer steps. It isn’t necessarily anything tangible, more of a subtle charisma or a humble confidence. This was true of your husband.

I would occasionally find myself watching him carefully and wondering about his story, for he always seemed to be a very gentle and courteous man, full of convention and civility. There wasn’t anything grand or mesmerizing in the Hollywood sense we are used to today, or even in the political sense that perhaps I am used to looking for. But he always struck me as possessing a unique inner strength, humble and caring and well-rounded, sure of himself even in the shadow of a successful wife. I found these qualities thought provoking and then in their turn, as strange as this may sound, reassuring, like seeing the buoys of your home harbor after a voyage across dark and unmarked waters.

Several years ago, two men in my life who I called “heroes”, or perhaps examples would be better, suddenly passed away within a few months of each other. They were men that I admired without reservation, men that did not disappoint. They possessed unparalleled strength of spirit, character, integrity and vision. They saw their own lives and the lives of others not for what they were but for what they could be. Their loss affected me deeply and left me grasping for living models of how to live.

While I did not know your husband the way I knew these men, he watered similar seeds of aspiration in my heart. I do not eulogize him for something he is not, for I really did not know him all that well, but for bringing to mind people I admired and loved, and showing others what a spirit of grace looks like.

My most heart-felt sympathies to you.

Sincerely,


Michael T. Gay