by Diane Rehm
I wanted to stay with him while the men from GW prepared to take him, but they gently urged me to leave the room. When they finally opened the door, I could see only the gray plastic shroud encasing him, something I’d never before seen other than on television or in movies. I put my arms around the center as he lay on the gurney and wept as I said a final goodbye to my beloved friend and partner.
David stood by my side as they wheeled John away. Then, together, we went back to my home to plan a memorial service.
Fifty-four Years of Marriage
When I think about our long marriage, my mind goes back to those early days when I as a secretary sat in an office at the Department of State, trying to make sense of this handsome and totally self-confident young man who was providing legal guidance to my boss about a U.S. trade agreement.
I could sense his curiosity about me, wondering why a young secretary should have such books as The Brothers Karamazov, the essays of Alfred North Whitehead, and Of Human Bondage on her desk. But there I sat, in my free time trying to educate myself about authors I realized other educated people had read. I wanted to know more about the world, and so I read.
I had had a wonderful high school education, but when graduation came, it was clear I would not be among the third of our class that went on to college. There were fundamentally two reasons: first, my parents couldn’t afford to pay for such an extension of my education, and expected me to go to work as a secretary to help with the household expenses; and second, my parents, who had both immigrated to this country from the Middle East, did not believe higher education was warranted for a young woman. However, I was hungry for knowledge, most especially in the halls of the Department of State, where I felt inferior to those around me, people who were ambassadors, members of the hierarchy of the department, even clerks who had college degrees.
When he wasn’t advising my boss, John began asking me questions about what I was reading and why. What were my insights, what were my ideas, how did I interpret a certain essay or a particular character? And that interest in the books on my desk started a sweet flirtation between us. That he was interested in me was very flattering. I realized it was about more than just what I was reading.
Then we began to talk about baseball, which we both loved. At the time, I was playing second base for the State Department’s women’s softball team, while John pitched for the department’s men’s softball team. Our conversation, I recall so vividly, turned to that year’s World Series, and we made a bet on which team would win. The bet: a dinner. He lost. I won. And we had our first dinner, which almost turned into a misadventure.
Without hesitation, John said he’d like to pay off the bet by taking me to what was then a Washington institution, Chez François. At the time, it was in the heart of our then relatively quiet city on Eighteenth Street, a beautiful and highly rated restaurant with a reputation for the finest French cuisine in town. And so we went by taxi, since neither of us owned a car at the time.
That dinner was one of the most memorable I’ve ever had. John and I never stopped talking, even as we ate and laughed and questioned each other about our current lives and backgrounds. I remember what I wore: a red silk blouse and a black velvet skirt. I recall the freshness of his smell, the beauty and strength of his hands, the elegance of his simply manicured nails, his blond crew cut, the kindness in his eyes. And yet at the end of the meal, I realized I was sick.
Perhaps out of sheer nervousness or due to rich food and wine to which I wasn’t accustomed, I developed a terrible stomachache. As we left the restaurant, I told John I didn’t feel well, and he suggested I come to his nearby apartment to rest before making the longer trip home. And so I did.
We walked into his modest efficiency apartment, where he suggested I lie down on his sofa. He then turned on his record player, putting on a recording of a piece of classical music. As I lay there, he sat quietly in a chair across the room, listening to the music with me. This went on for about an hour, until I felt my stomach easing and said I was ready to leave. He walked me to the curb and hailed a cab to take me home. And that was the glamorous end of our first date.
Happily, the first began a series of dates: dinner dates, walking dates, concert and theater dates, during which John became my teacher. There was no question I could ask him that he couldn’t answer, whether it was about literature, music, foreign policy, or politics. He loved teaching me. He loved my questions. He told me early on that it felt as though I was the little sister he’d never had but always wanted. I can say with certainty that he rejoiced in my questions, in my curiosity, in my wanting to learn.
John was a born teacher, and confessed to me that, had it not been for the need to earn a good income, he would never have gone into law. He’d majored and excelled in Greek and Latin at Harvard, but in the end applied for law school, three years in his life that he did not enjoy. So I filled the student niche. His role as teacher, with me as pupil, continued for many, many years.
It was not until several weeks later that we kissed for the first time, in the boxwood gardens of George Mason’s home at Gunston Hall in Virginia. Such a sweet and tender kiss. Perfect time. Perfect place.
After we were married, on December 19, 1959, student was not the only void I filled for John. To say that I craved friendship is putting it too strongly, but I did want to bring other people into our lives.
John’s work at the State Department was regarded as brilliant. In fact, he was chosen by then legal adviser Abram Chayes as the youngest assistant legal adviser for economic affairs the State Department had ever had. In that position, he helped to create the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) during the Kennedy administration. Then he became the first general counsel to that office, under Governor Christian Herter. John often said these thirteen years in government were the very best of his legal career. In fact, had Hubert Humphrey rather than Richard Nixon been elected in 1968, John might have stayed in government for many more years.
Since John’s death, I have received several letters from his former colleagues, and none moved me more than this from Bernard Norwood:
At the time we were in USTR, I was closer to no one than John. He was a warm friend, generous supporter, and great inspiration. Very soon after joining him in that office, I came to recognize, not only his great spirit and helpfulness, but also his special competence. His orderliness in thinking and drafting were striking. Rapidly and clearly, he put everything into its correct place—mentally and in writing. No “miscellaneous” file would ever be found in his file cabinet.
Those senior positions during both the Kennedy and Johnson administrations brought us many invitations to wonderful events, which we both enjoyed. Further, we began to attend St. Patrick’s Episcopal Church regularly, which brought us into contact with new people. We began to entertain, to cook for large groups, many of whom have remained friends to this day. John was a terrific host, always seemingly happy about having parties and doing it all with good grace and humor. But not necessarily with great enthusiasm. He would acknowledge that, were it not for me, he probably would have led a more monastic life, one where he spent most of his time alone, with music and books.
John had such a brilliant mind, and he was a fabulous listener—people loved being with him more than he loved being with them. He adored talking with strangers, to learn about their lives, to offer assistance when he could. And one day, on a corner of Connecticut Avenue, he met an individual he knew he had to do more than just listen to.
The man had set up a card table on which there was a single sheet of written material, which he was trying to give to anyone who would take it. Always curious, John stopped to read, and began talking to Constantin Rauta, who poured out to him the fact that he had been given asylum in the United States, but that his wife, Kathy, and his infant son were being held by the Ceaus¸escu government in Romania as punishment for Constantin’s leaving the country.
Now I ask you, how many people would stop to listen,
let alone follow up on such a claim? But that’s precisely what John did. By this time, John had left government and was an attorney in private practice. After doing a great deal of research on Constantin’s claims, he went to Patricia Derian, then Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs during the Carter administration, and enlisted her help in getting Constantin’s wife and son out of Romania. Months of pondering began over the best way to deal with the reality of the repressive regime in which Kathy was a virtual prisoner.
Finally, John himself went to Romania, purportedly to deal with a different legal problem. Secretly, he met with Kathy in a public park in Bucharest. She was very frightened, fearful even of John, afraid that somehow he was a secret Romanian agent sent to entrap her and put her in prison.
I was equally fearful of his going there, but John was determined. He knew he had to carry out this mission. He believed in Constantin, and believed he could be of critical assistance.
Finally, several months after that visit, due to John’s efforts and with the ongoing help of the State Department, Kathy and her son were reunited with Constantin. Kathy’s fears still lingered, but eventually she realized what John had done for her and her family, simply out of the goodness of his heart. He understood her fears and her reservations, and treated her with gentle kindness.
I will always remember John for that gentleness, whether it was toward another human being or a tiny spider. Whenever I spotted an insect in the house, John would find a way to capture the creature without hurting it, and deposit it outdoors. I admired his kindness and patience with others, even those I might be impatient with.
John was a loving man, a caring man, whom I adored for all that he was and all that he gave to me, to his children, and to the world. I’ve said many times to myself and to others that were it not for John’s love for me and mine for him, I might be dead by now. I realize that’s a pretty dramatic statement, but it’s true.
I was a smoker, from the time we met until after our second child, Jennie, was born, in 1964. I had started smoking when I was fifteen, and, by the time of her birth, I was smoking two packs a day. And one day John had the love and the courage to say to me, “The smell of cigarettes on you, on your clothes, in your hair, is not pleasant. I’m having a really hard time with it.”
Vanity is a strong motivator. Several weeks later, at a New Year’s Eve party we hosted, I stood up at midnight and told our guests I had smoked my last cigarette. John had doubts I would or could keep my word, but I just couldn’t bear the thought that my husband was turned off by my scent. And so I never smoked another cigarette, and, today, I can thank my husband for helping me avoid what could well have been an extremely foreshortened life.
Throughout the early years of our marriage, I was basically content to be a homemaker, to prepare meals for our small family, to do all the necessary chores to keep a household running: the grocery shopping, the carpooling, the cooperative nursery school participation, and the entertaining. But John made two very important purchases for me that made a huge difference in my life.
First, a beautiful used baby grand piano. I’d wanted to study piano all through my childhood, but my parents could afford neither a piano nor lessons. And so I began taking piano lessons in my mid-twenties, satisfying my heart’s yearning and feeling the gift of John’s love as he perceived that yearning and found a way to satisfy it. Jennie and David followed on, both of them learning to play extraordinarily well, majoring in music in college. That same piano now sits here in my apartment.
Second, a brand-new Singer sewing machine. My mother had been a wonderful and creative seamstress, and I had taken basic sewing lessons in high school. I knew I wanted to try my hand at it again, and with John’s wish to help me fulfill that desire, I began producing beautiful clothes, not only for myself but for the children, and even a few attempts at shirts for John, which he wore from time to time, perhaps more for my sake than because he really liked them.
And then came the fateful day when I accidentally and unknowingly found my new career. The year was 1973, and I was desperately seeking something to expand my horizons, knowing that soon my children would be completely out of the house and I would need to find some other way to feel useful in this world. By chance, a dear friend mentioned to me that she was enjoying herself immensely volunteering at a radio station on the campus of American University. Having been raised on radio, with all its wonderful soap operas and serials, and with no television in our home until I was fifteen years old, I was immediately intrigued. And so I asked whether she might introduce me to the person hosting the program on which she was working. A week later, my friend called and said I would be welcome to come for an interview. I was simultaneously thrilled and petrified, especially because of the location, American University. The fear of somehow being rejected because I was a non–college graduate rumbled in my stomach (where most of my anxieties seem to lie).
I found my future the very first day I walked through the doors of WAMU. At the time, it was a small radio station, not yet a member of NPR. I offered myself as a volunteer for a program called The Home Show.
From the start of those volunteer days at WAMU, John became my loudest cheerleader and greatest coach. He helped me deal with my fears, mostly about my own lack of knowledge and understanding of the world. He encouraged me, he brought me new ideas, he held me when I was overwhelmed, he loved me through all my doubts. And our love grew, as our children grew, even as we evolved into new people with new interests in the world.
Even after he moved to Brighton Gardens, John would offer ideas and suggestions for programs. He cared so much about life outside that room. Reading the New York Times and the Washington Post so early in the morning, he had always brought me new thoughts and insights that I could weave into my thinking about what ultimately became The Diane Rehm Show.
Our physical attraction to each other, so strong at the beginning of our relationship with that first kiss, endured long into our marriage. To say we “fit” perfectly is not an exaggeration. Together, we created a space for ourselves, something we both regarded as the most magical of all human miracles. Our greatest moments of openness came in those extraordinary expressions of love, when the receptiveness of two bodies allows for the sharing of minds. Together in those moments, we enjoyed the perfection of our marriage.
But no marriage is perfect, and certainly ours was far from it. I came to realize that John used lovemaking as a way to reconnect with me after a period of silence and distance. It was his way to avoid confronting the reality of openly discussing whatever the problem was. And it worked, because I was so hungry for reconnection that I rejoiced when the cloud lifted and we could once again speak to each other with warmth and kindness. Clearly, each of us would have become such a different person without the other. I know in my heart we were meant to be together, and, toward the end of his life, John acknowledged that as well. We were a team.
John comes to me now in short sentences, in words of encouragement, in moments of concern. And in the example he set for me and others throughout our lives.
The Memorial Service
John had indicated he would like the service to be held at St. Patrick’s Episcopal Church, where he’d been baptized in 1979, at the age of forty-nine. We had attended services there for more than twenty years.
His had been a long journey toward Christianity, one he described vividly in his own book, Onward Journey: Seeking the Divine:
In the spring of 1979, I adopted the practice of dropping in at local churches at different hours. I would engage in an informal meditation, with no particular substance or direction. Something was at work within me, although my conscious being was puzzled.
Then came June 23, 1979, a sparkling summer morning in Manhattan. I was walking up Fifth Avenue to have lunch with my mother near the Metropolitan Museum of Art. I came to 52nd Street and found myself spontaneously entering St. Thomas Church. I sat down in one of the pews. There were only a few
other people in the church.
The following events then took place in an extraordinarily rapid succession. I became aware of a Baroque air being rehearsed by an organist. The first line of Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poem “The Windhover: To Christ our Lord” leaped to mind: “I caught this morning morning’s minion, kingdom of daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon….” It was then blindingly clear that Christ had caught me, and His presence flooded every part of my being. He leveled the massive stone wall I had amassed against Him over the years. For a timeless duration, I sobbed uncontrollably in a paroxysm of joy. I left the church a new man and Christ’s own.
Later that same year, John, whose parents had raised him without any belief in a Higher Power, was baptized as a child of Christ, with my dearest friend, Bishop Jane Dixon, acting as his godmother, and his law partner, David Busby, as godfather.
And now it was June 23, 2014. The symmetry was absolutely unmistakable: John died on the very same day, thirty-five years later, that he had felt the stones fall away and the light of Christ surround him in the Church of the Doubting Thomas. Many would say it was coincidence. I believe deep down that John felt himself moving toward a very special moment, a moment when he would actually be with God, and this became his day to go.
My first call when David and I got back to the apartment was to the rector of St. Patrick’s, Reverend Kurt Gerhard, who had visited with John once several months earlier and given him Holy Communion. I wanted him to know that John had died, and to ask whether he, and St. Patrick’s Church, would be available for a memorial service on Saturday, June 28. Kurt was in West Virginia that week, counseling young children at summer camp, but he readily agreed to hold the service on that date.
