On the Life of my Dad, G. Lindsay Mattison
Lately I’ve been leaning heavily on the word “complicated.” It’s a shorthand that captures all the things we often leave unsaid. I tell people the relationship was “complicated” and they nod. We all understand at some level: No one is ever all one thing, no statement of fact is ever all true. These things are… complicated.
My father was unable to maintain relationships. And in the end that was as sad for him as it was for us.
But he was also a man of great beginnings.
Lindsay was brilliant and charming, endlessly full of exciting ideas. As his friend Bill Curry said, “He was great at take offs, not so good at landing.”
At his memorial service, the conversation was lively and breathtaking. I found myself wishing “they” were still bugging the office, to capture all the incredible snippets of a wild political life: “…Then there was the whole Iran-Contra thing … and when Lindsay pulled together the meeting with the Mujahideen … and because of the stinger-bombs they had to land in a looping spiral ... when the FBI broke into the office ... Lindsay’s file had all kinds of mundane minutia, down to what he ordered at restaurants … That ex-CIA guy — whatshisname… wait, who was with the KGB? … brought over the ANC, back when they were considered terrorists and no one would talk to them … and she said Lindsay couldn’t even be relied upon to buy toilet paper — totally f-ing incompetent … a literal paper bag with $35,000 cash … Senator [redacted] … mercenaries, revolutionaries, everybody all together … Lindsay brought him to meet with them. He was on the terrorist list, I think, and then later became president of the country …”
Lindsay Mattison launched people. The International Center he (sort-of) ran for decades was a chaotic incubator of forward-thinking politics and policy. “He was not just passionate about the causes that were important to him, but also the causes that were important to others,” said Liubov Russel, who is now at the State Department. “I was working on the US-Bulgaria Trade Council…and Lou Ivey asked him ‘But Lindsay, you’re not interested in Bulgaria. Why are you doing this?’ And he said ‘Yes, I don’t even know where Bulgaria is! But it’s important to her.’ … And so I was able to bring the Congressman to Bulgaria.”
Central America activist Margarita Swarez shared incredible stories. “Not only did he love us, but he really respected us. A lot of people love us, and it’s nice for people to care about our pain. But what is most important is when people respect us and realize all we need is allies. And that what Lindsay really was.”
The fact that he wasn’t really capable of follow through was both his greatest strength and his greatest weakness. It meant he was always handing off world-changing projects to the people with the dedication to take ownership and see them through. He was always creating seats at the table for anyone with the passion to do the work. Often these were women and minorities who were shut out of other rooms in DC.
Lindsay brought all kinds of people together, enabled them to do incredible things, and then left them to do it. And so they would. Off he would go to the next thing that caught his eye.
This trait helped him bring a great deal of good into the world and into so many people’s lives. It also made him an unreliable parent and partner.
When a person dies, we get to take a step back. There is a shift from the temporary current state of our relationship and feelings, and we get to look at the entirety of a life. We have the space to look at the whole relationship and how they lived.
And Lindsay lived with so much irreverent humor. The world was taking itself far too seriously, and he was there to poke it in the eye.
Nothing was sacred. Nothing was above mockery. Nothing was beyond challenge. Irony, wit and satire were his tools to fight authoritarians of all sizes. (I think it's why he loved the Russians so much.) There was nothing he loved more than mocking little dictators who abused their power. And in his eye, all dictators were little dictators, compensating for something or other.
His eye for the absurdities of the human condition extended to the animal world as well. He was known as great bird watcher, but he was also a great bird narrator.
On long walks, we would investigate marshes and creeks. And Dad would tell stories of infighting and uprisings in the sqwaks along the river banks. The elegant great blue heron would silently stalk it’s prey, and when it finally struck, he would cry, "Oh God, there goes Fred! Goodbye Fred!"
With him, there were characters everywhere. People with strange predilections lurked in every town, and Dad had an amazing knack for finding them. It wasn’t that he brought out the quirks in people, but that he collected quirky people.
He was harsh in his judgements of people he declared to be dull, and this cut across class and status without mercy. He had nothing but distain for arrogant idiots, especially those with too much power.
He liked those who had something — anything — fascinating to share. There was nothing Lindsay respected more than craftsmanship and knowledge. He loved long discussions with people who knew a great deal about any subject. Obsessive, intelligent, passionate people drinking late into the night and really getting to the heart of the matter — that is what he lived for.
He taught me that there is often more truth in laughter than in earnestness. He taught me that no one is above biting social commentary. He taught me to treasure the strange, brilliant, flawed people of late nights and literature.
Most importantly, he taught me that no one and no thing is too big or too small to take note of.
