Campaign Update: Mother’s Day Reflections
Campaign Update: Mother’s Day Reflections
Friends, Family, and Supporters,
A friend said to me, “She would have been 102.” She was talking about her mother. The I miss her every day was unspoken. My mom, Lucinda, would have been 86 if she were alive today.
My mom was a teacher who taught young GIs when my dad was stationed in Germany, public junior high and high school students in St. Louis, and later worked as a kindergarten aide and primary school reading specialist. Her mother didn’t go to college, but she did — taking an extra year, changing schools, and relying on the support of friends to earn her degree after her father died.
She was my first teacher. She taught me to read. She shared her love of nature and the environment. A gardener, she composted long before it was “in.” She searched for natural pesticides to protect her roses from thrips. She knew the Latin names of every plant. She volunteered at the Missouri Botanical Garden for many years, answering phone calls and conducting botanical research — pre‑internet — for plant lovers from all over the world. She eventually became a master gardener.
I am the youngest, by fourteen months, of two daughters. By the time I was born, my mother had had both a kidney and an ovary removed. By the time I was eight, she had lost most of the vision in her right eye to a disease called histoplasmosis and had suffered from viral encephalomyelitis. I remember my sister and me calling my dad’s office from a pay phone because we’d gone out and my mother had had some kind of seizure. She referred to these episodes as “spells.”
And then, when she must have hoped the worst was behind her, she started losing vision in her good eye; the histoplasmosis had spread. They performed laser surgery to try to preserve her vision. After the surgery — ironically — she was blind. I cared for her, as did my sister. There was no family and medical leave for my father to take (and there still isn’t, in most places). After school, my sister and I cooked what we knew how to cook and dished a lot of ice cream, which my mother loved. I rubbed her feet and read her Leon Uris. I was terrified, for her and for me.
Eventually her vision improved, and she had some very good years. She went back to teaching. She cared for my daughter three days each week for the first nine months of her life because we could not afford daycare on my single salary, even had we been able to find it — and this is still true.
When her health was failing, I wanted to be there with her. We did not think we could afford it.
We all face challenges in life. But our challenges aren’t equal, and we have little to no control over them. Our lot in life bears little to no relationship to the quality of our choices or to how hard we work. One unexpected illness can change everything.
We do not choose and cannot control our zip code, our family’s means, our genetic inheritance, our gender, race, sexual orientation, or our luck.
And yet we all deserve a dignified life. In a country and a time of relative abundance, I believe that we all should have access to food, housing, health, care, education, and meaningful jobs that enable families to sustain themselves.
This is the reason I am running for the Maryland House of Delegates.
Support The Campaign!
If you are local — in District 18 or the wider county — there are many ways to get involved! Drop me a note or give me a call. You do not need to be a resident of Maryland or District 18 to contribute.
We do not accept funds from large corporations or PACs. This campaign is funded by friends and neighbors - please make a contribution, today!
We have numerous volunteer opportunities including phone banking, text banking, literature distribution, and door-knocking, and more!
We are also looking to attend more community and small group events - have one in mind? Let me know!
In Solidarity,
Kate
Democratic Candidate for Delegate, District 18
202.294.5141
By Authority: Kate Stein for D18
Treasurer, Deborah Williams
DIGNITY · FAIRNESS · FAMILY · COMMUNITY
