Carol Neal Hannah

I received this wonderful email from an old friend of my mother's. It is so good that I cannot possibly do it justice by talking about it. So without further ado:

Linda came to the northwoods of Wisconsin a couple of years ago. We had some good chuckles about our chance meeting on a street in New York City so many years ago. She was working for Alan Lomax at the time. She said he told her he hired her because she had great legs.

When Linda visited, I had a hard time recognizing her at the Minneapolis airport because she was so thin. I wondered at the time if something could be wrong. (In her wonderful whimsical way, she told me to look for wildly colored shoes -- it worked. That's how I found her.)

We picked blueberries together, wandered forest paths, and talked about old school days. She told me amazing tales about how all the University School kids jockeyed for position based on their father's successes (a competition I was thankfully spared) and how everyone's (well, not quite everyone's) mothers were part of a network that helped form the social lives of the kids.

Linda lost her dad to cancer when she was 12. We formed a bond at that time as the only two in class without a father. While I felt bad for Linda, I welcomed her company. We spent a lot of time after that plotting our escape from Columbia.

Linda and I exchanged many emails about politics. She was notable in her staunch ethics. We disagreed often about methodology but rarely about position. E-mailing her was good for honing one's arguments!

Linda was sorry to have missed the first reunion and said she really wanted to attend the next one.

She talked a lot about her family. She loved having many children and loved the constant drama of large family life.

She didn't feel she had done so much good for the world through her work. But I think she judged her situation way too harshly. How can checking and consulting about water systems in the Middle East not be worthwhile? If for no other reason, Linda's work was meaningful because she reached through our country's dreadful myopia; she admired and learned about other cultures. She never hung around with the ex-pats but instead she established good friendships with people of the countries where she worked. I honor her for those accomplishments. The world needs more Lindas right now.

Rest in peace, Linda,
Carol Neal Hannah