“When I was here I think it’s fair to say I was a leading political activist. You know, Vietnam, the Women’s movement, there was the whole black thing, the grape boycott, Earth Day. And I think one of the things Bob pushed me and really taught me–because I was into the immediate–Bob really pushed me that this was a long-term thing. If you were going to do it you had to be serious about it. I remember after we did the [spring 1970] college strike, that fall many of us went back and were very concerned because they found they couldn’t change the world in a week. I went on to the [Michael] Dukakis lieutenant governor’s campaign that summer and have never stopped going on the activism stuff. But I’ve done it with civility. Bob was civil.
I don’t think I was uncivil [to start] but I was un-thoughtful. Bob really pushed one to challenge assumptions, to ask, “Why are you doing this?” And he taught me about quiet. To appreciate the silence. To appreciate the thinking. Which I still struggle with. A book Marty Linsky has written talks about “getting on the balcony,” pulling back. “The Reflective Practitioner” is another book others have written. He taught me to be reflective. He taught me to challenge my own beliefs, question my own assumptions, and an appreciation of people with a different point of view. Pogo, one of the great philosophers of all time, said “I have met the enemy and he is us.” Bob would challenge me to look at the political stuff, which I was from the day I got here almost blindly diving into. Asking, “Why are you doing this?”
I have no idea what his politics were.