I met Kathy in 1980, the day after Labor Day, at 26 Federal Plaza in lower Manhattan. I was arriving to go to work as a lowly researcher for former President Nixon. As his confidential secretary and future chief of staff, she buzzed me into his office on the 13th floor, around the corner from the immigration court and HUD library.
The power differential was such that I don’t believe she spoke to me again until mid-1981. For a couple of years, she wrote my phone messages on the backs of napkins, just because she could. Our friendship formed slowly in the common cause of sticking up for the world’s then most controversial politician, helping with his books, and following him everywhere, from Beijing to Burma.
During our New York years, we married our then sweethearts and had kids at about the same time. They’ve known one another all their lives. Dan and Valerie, Lindsay and Meaghan. Our family is blended like a $10 milkshake.
And here’s the secret for Kathy and me. In “Ocean’s 11,” George Clooney, playing Danny, asks Julia Roberts, playing Tess, if her current boyfriend makes her laugh. Now married 22 years, Kathy and I would both say yes. When everyone’s over at the house and laughing, especially Frannie and Harriet, our grandchildren, it feels like heaven. When they leave, I always want to say that it would be good if they could stay forever.
Each year, we celebrate our anniversary on July 6 and the anniversary of my episcopal consecration seven years ago on July 8. This is us last night at Smitty’s Grill in Pasadena. As retirement nears in late 2026, I’m also hoarding the sense of belonging and joy that comes from being part of a diocesan family. It would be good if it went on forever. But it doesn’t have to, because, in a way, in the heart of our God in Christ, it does.
And those heavenly halls had better echo with joy. Answering Danny’s question, Tess says, “He doesn’t make me cry.” That’s a great start. May we awaken each day with the prayer that we will not be the cause of someone’s tears, by our action or inaction, personally or systemically. There are enough trails of tears. I want to walk as a child of the laugh. I’m in the middle of Barbra Streisand’s splendid memoir — and if you’re of a certain age, you’ll remember her song: “It’s the laughter we will remember.” And we must know how the sound delights God. We feel it every time.