Living History Unknown (best books to read fiction .txt) 📖

“You can’t shake hands with him,” they told me. “You can’t talk to him.” Even if I accidentally bumped into him, the anti-Castro factions in Florida would go wild.

I frequently looked over my shoulder during the reception, watching for his bushy gray beard in the crowd of faces. In the middle of a fascinating conversation with somebody like King Mswati III of Swaziland, I’d suddenly spot Castro moving toward me, and I’d hightail it to a far corner of the room. It was ridiculous, but I knew that a single photograph, stray sentence or chance encounter could become news.

Lunch was served on the grounds under an enormous white canvas tent. Mandela rose to address his guests. I love listening to him speak in that slow, dignified manner that manages to be both formal and alive with good humor. He made the expected remarks to welcome us. Then he said something that left me in awe: While he was pleased to host so many dignitaries, he was most pleased to have in attendance three of his former jailers from Robben Island who had treated him with respect during his imprisonment. He asked them to stand so he could introduce them to the crowd.

His generosity of spirit was inspiring and humbling. For months I had been preoccupied with the hostility in Washington and the meanspirited attacks connected to Whitewater, Vince Foster and the travel office. But here was Mandela, honoring three men who had held him prisoner.

When I got to know Mandela better, he explained that as a young man he had a quick temper. In prison he learned to control his emotions in order to survive. His years in jail had given him the time and motivation to look deeply into his own heart and to deal with the pain he found. He reminded me that gratitude and forgiveness, which often result from pain and suffering, require tremendous discipline. The day his imprisonment ended, he told me, “as I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn’t leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I’d still be in prison.”

Still pondering Mandela’s example the night I returned from South Africa, I joined five former First Ladies at the National Garden Gala. I was the honorary Chair of the event at the U.S. Botanic Garden to help raise funds to construct a new garden that would be a living landmark on the Mall, dedicated to eight contemporary First Ladies and honoring our contributions to the nation.

I was delighted that Lady Bird Johnson was able to attend. She and I wrote each other during my years in the White House, and she was a comforting and affirming correspondent.

I admired the quiet strength and grace she had brought to her position as First Lady.

She began a beautification program that spread wildflowers along thousands of miles of U.S. highways and enhanced our appreciation of the natural landscape. Through Lady Bird’s advocacy, a generation of Americans learned new respect for the environment and were inspired to preserve it. She also championed Head Start, the early learning program for disadvantaged children. And when it came to campaigning, she barnstormed the South for her husband in his 1964 race against Barry Goldwater. Throughout a difficult time in the White House, she understood that presidential politics required commitment and sacrifice. With her intelligence and compassion, she held her own in a world dominated by Lyndon Johnson’s oversize personality Disheartened by Washington, I valued her hard-won sense of perspective.

The photos from that gala evening were keepers: Lady Bird, Barbara Bush, Nancy Reagan, Rosalynn Carter, Betty Ford and me. It was quite a sight: all the living First Ladies standing together onstage – except for one.

Some months earlier, Jackie Kennedy Onassis had been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, an often deadly but sometimes slow-moving cancer. As a result, she was unable to be with us. We’d been told that she had gone through surgery, but not how quickly she had weakened. True to character, she tried to keep her dying as private as she’d kept her life.

On May 19, 1994, Jackie died in her New York apartment, with Caroline, John and Maurice at her side. Early the following morning, Bill and I went to the Jacqueline Kennedy Garden off the east colonnade of the White House to share our thoughts with a gathering of press, staff and friends. Bill recognized her contributions to our country, while I talked about her selfless devotion to her children and grandchildren: “She once explained the importance of spending time with family and said: ‘If you bungle raising your children, I don’t think whatever else you do matters very much.’ “ I could not have agreed more. I attended her funeral mass in New York City at St. Ignatius Loyola Roman Catholic Church and then flew to Washington with her family and close friends. Bill met the plane at the airport and went with us to the grave where Jackie was buried beside President John E Kennedy, their infant son, Patrick, and an unnamed stillborn daughter.

After the graveside ceremony, we joined the extended Kennedy clan at Ethel Kennedy’s nearby home, Hickory Hill.

Two weeks later, John E Kennedy, Jr., sent Bill and me a handwritten letter that I cherish. “I wanted you both to understand how much your burgeoning friendship with my mother meant to her,” he wrote. “Since she left Washington I believe she resisted ever connecting with it emotionally―or the institutional demands of being a former First Lady. It had much to do with the memories stirred and her desires to resist being cast in a lifelong role that didn’t quite fit. However, she seemed profoundly happy and relieved to allow herself to reconnect with it through you. It helped her in a profound way―whether it was discussing the perils of raising children in those circumstances (perilous indeed) or perhaps it was the many similarities between your presidency and my father’s.”

In early June 1994, Bill and I