U & D

Our friend Rosie Shiras passed on last week. She would not be pleased to know of the emptiness and sorrow I feel. She would want me to laugh and tell stories about her. She would laugh that just now I could not find my glasses in my handbag, only to discover them hanging from a chain around my neck.

Rosie has only seven Google hits. She would ask, What’s a Google hit? I would try to explain, and she would nod her head seriously, but I would stop before finishing because the nature of the hits would be more important to Rosie. She was one of the 902 signers of the 2007 Just Say No to Fast Track letter to Congress printed in the the NYT. There she is on page 8, between Susan V. Shipherd and Ravinda Shukla. She must have been pleased to be part of such a diverse group; pleased to have made a difference; pleased to be able to DO something. I bet she clipped that ad and filed it away somewhere – in a notebook – annotated. Perhaps she went to Staples and had it photocopied and sent it to someone in her vast network, accompanied by a letter written by hand on lined paper.

I surprised Rosie at Staples one day. I was buying computer cables; she was pretending to buy an electric typewriter. She told me it was time to enter the electronic age. I’m pretty sure she didn’t buy the typewriter, or if she did buy it, she didn’t learn to use it, because I continued to get long notes written on lined paper.

The last note Rosie sent to me was accompanied by a photocopy (for some reason, all of Rosie’s photocopies looked like they had been made in the 80’s – I imagined that she had an ancient Xerox machine in her winter home) of an article about the psychology of Native American depression. Her note said, “I thought you would find this interesting. Let’s talk.” Of course Rosie subscribed to this scholarly journal, and of course she read every word. We did talk about the article, on April 3, at the LD 291 Best Practices conference. I left that conference all fired up; Rosie called me that night because sparks were not her way. She wanted, I think, to make sure that I would stay on an even path. That was our last conversation; it was also the genesis of U & D.

When I first met Rosie I wore my most NY preppy outfit. She took one look at me in the driveway of her beautiful Orr’s Island home and said, “That’s nice, very nice.” Her voice was gravel ground smooth by time, a whisper carried like birch seed around and through. She was lovely, in slim jeans, a Western belt, and turquoise. On anyone else I would have found the outfit “wannabe” and the greeting presumptuous; but on Rosie they fit just right. Rosie was old words, like grand, mannerly, polite, honest, cultured, generous, and even elegant (if you have ever seen Rosie eat a hoagie, you will know what I mean). But she was also now words, like protest, rebel, change, intensity, and cause. Wonderful Rosie wore these words not like badges, but like life. She had become them and they became her.

I learned over time and rides to Orono a little about Rosie’s past – her activism for Native and peace causes, her true love of Native cultures in Maine and in the West, her tireless work to educate and extend learning, her deep love and admiration for her family. Walking away from lunch on April 3, we talked about the illness and death that had been around us both that winter and spring. These things, her voice told me, have their time.

Rosie never seemed to be in a hurry; but she was always deliberate. Next to her, I felt like a duckling.

Rosie’s passion for LD 291 was deep and true. She would be pleased that her 3rd Google hit is as a list of participants in the 2007 Common Grounds Fair. She is listed under Native American. Rosie’s spirit must be saying, “That’s wonderful, just wonderful.”

Oh, Rosie Shiras, how wonderful it must be to have a name that sounds like the wind.