Spoken From The Heart Part 20

The Mae Tao Clinic is the place Dr. Cynthia Maung calls home. She is a Burmese doctor who fled into Thailand in 1988, when she was twenty-nine years old. She was running from chaos; in the cities, Burmese troops knelt and fired repeatedly on unarmed demonstrators protesting the repressive junta. To silence some of the protesters, the regime's forces rounded them up and drowned them. Dr. Cynthia escaped by walking through the jungles at night. When the sun rose, she slept in fields. She crossed the border at Mae Sot and began life in a refugee camp. Soon she was setting up a primitive medical clinic to treat refugees who arrived with war wounds or who had contracted malaria. She sterilized her instruments by boiling them in an aluminum rice cooker and thought she would return home in two, possibly three months. Twenty years later, she has made only brief forays across the jungle-laced border to care for the sick in Burma. She remains in Thailand, at her clinic, where she is known as the Mother Teresa of the Burmese.

I had already "met" Dr. Cynthia via a White House teleconference on Burma, but now I had the chance to talk to her face-to-face and to shake her hand. I walked into her open-air clinic, and the first thing I saw was a volunteer American doctor performing cataract surgery in a building with open windows. Outside the rains of a tropical thunderstorm poured down, turning the paths to mud. In another section was a row of picnic tables covered with plastic s.h.i.+elds. That was where they placed the newborns.

They weighed the babies on a vegetable scale, laying each on a paper napkin. The clinic also fits prosthetics--legs, arms, feet--for all the people who lost limbs to the many land mines planted by the military junta. Refugees are being trained to make the prosthetic molds and casts, for which there is near-constant demand. Fifty thousand Burmese also cross the border each year to visit Mae Tao to seek medical care. Many walk hundreds of miles from deep inside Burma to the clinic. I left behind crates of donated supplies, including thousands of bed nets to help prevent malaria, which is rampant in the region.

Thirty miles away, pushed up against the sides of steep, forested mountains, their tops obscured by drifting clouds and rain, is the Mae La Refugee Camp. The sprawling camp winds its way around six hills at the Thai-Burma border. Today children who were born in Mae La two decades ago are having children of their own. None of them has ever set foot outside Mae La's compound of muddy paths and hutlike homes. Thai law requires them to remain confined to their camps in a stateless limbo. More than 140,000 Burmese refugees live in camps like this strung along the Thai-Burma border, nearly 40,000 in Mae La alone, at least according to official estimates. The actual totals may be much higher. Beyond the camps, as many as 1.5 million other Burmese live inside Thailand.

At Mae La there are now twenty-six schools, built from weathered bamboo, with open sides and topped by thatched roofs. What few desks and chairs they had rested on damp, earthen floors. At the school I visited, two young American women were helping to teach English. One of the boys stood and wrote a slightly halting message to me on the blackboard, "My life in refugee is better than Burma, but I don't have opportunity to out outside the camp. I would like to speak English, so I am now trying hard." They lived in a camp without jobs, where there is no electricity and no running water, yet they came to learn and dreamed of a better life. A few would get that chance.

In 2005 the U.S. Congress changed the immigration requirements for Burmese refugees. By the time of my visit, over twenty thousand Burmese had been cleared to resettle in the United States. Three families were preparing to board a bus for the first stage of their trip when I arrived at Mae La. One family was going to Florida; another was headed to South Carolina; and a third was leaving for Texas. Their belongings were packed into brightly colored rice sacks.

At Mae La, I was greeted by teenagers performing a traditional Burmese dance. It was a dance from a land over the mountains, a land they had never seen from outside their bamboo walls. The next day, August 8, 2008, would mark twenty years since the brutal government crackdown that drove so many Burmese to run for their lives into Thailand.

That is part of what is ultimately so tragic about these repressive regimes, in Burma, in Afghanistan, in Liberia. They go on for years, in some cases, like Burma, for generations. Whole generations pa.s.s, and the culture erodes. Under the junta, half the people in Burma suffer from malnutrition and hunger. And when these regimes finally do collapse, everything has to be rebuilt. There is no infrastructure for people to even begin to start over, no economic infrastructure, no civil infrastructure, no physical infrastructure, no power lines or good roads. It takes years to rebuild.

It was almost surreal to leave the refugee camp and arrive that night in Beijing, China, which had spent years preparing for a grand Summer Olympics. In a speech in Bangkok, George had called on the Chinese to cease detaining political dissidents, human rights activists, and religious activists. He spoke out in support of a free press, freedom of a.s.sembly, and labor rights, saying, "The United States believes the people of China deserve the fundamental liberty that is the natural right of all human beings. . . . Trusting its people with greater freedom is the only way for China to develop its full potential."

China was consumed with its global spectacle. And we relished every minute of watching our amazing athletes compete on the world stage. We waved flags and cheered, moving from the Olympic swimming pool to the basketball stadium to the imported sand court for beach volleyball. It was a stunning sight to see the Chinese cheering for the American basketball players, chanting "Kobe, Kobe" for Kobe Bryant. And we were equally proud when our basketball team lined the seats of the Olympic pool to shout as

Michael Phelps won his string of gold medals. The men's team came and cheered at the women's games. It was a genuine display of camaraderie and sportsmans.h.i.+p.

I was particularly touched by one event, the men's 400-meter freestyle in the Olympic pool. Michael Phelps won the gold, while fellow American swimmer La.r.s.en Jensen won the bronze. After the ceremony, all three medalists made a celebratory walk around the pool, and George and I waited at the rail to greet them. As he took his first steps, Michael Phelps tossed his bouquet of red roses into the crowd, and the silver medalist soon did the same. But La.r.s.en Jensen held on to his. When he reached me, he lifted his arm to hand me his flowers, saying, "I want you to have these."

Gampy joined us, remembering the days thirty years before when he had been the United States' official diplomat to China after President Nixon reestablished relations.

President Hu Jintao had us to lunch in the Forbidden City, the centuries-old compound of the emperors, tucked behind ma.s.sive red walls. There were small meandering streams and gardens, but the ancient rooms are now largely bare, leaving their past to our imaginations.

As September opened, we expected a harsh presidential campaign but an otherwise calm fall. Within two weeks our a.s.sumptions had been thoroughly dashed.

George's presidency would be bookended by two Septembers, the September of 9-11, when the nation was devastated by forces without, and the September of 2008, when it was threatened with collapse from within.

My own experience with economic collapse came from the fierce boom and bust oil cycles in Midland. Each time, people were lulled into believing that the boom would last, and each time, the oil markets collapsed with the slimmest of warnings. Economics was not part of my portfolio in the White House, but along the dusty streets of Midland I had known highly educated geologists who lost their jobs and families who left town because when the well drilling ceased and the derricks were shut down, there was nothing left for them. But the crisis we now faced was engulfing not one Texas town but vast swaths of the nation. Week after week the White House was working around the clock to manage the financial crisis. Some staffers barely left their desks. George's term began just after the dot-com bubble had burst, plunging the nation into recession. In his final months, he was working to contain another bursting bubble as it direly threatened the entire U.S. economy.

In the news and on the presidential campaign trail, George was attacked ruthlessly. We had both long ago given up stewing over the things said about either one of us. When you are president, there simply isn't time. George did not have time to be mad at a press person who wrote or said something nasty about him. He did not have time to be upset at a candidate who lashed out at him in an effort to secure higher office. Then too, as we had long ago learned, there is a certain luxury that comes from being a candidate. It is easy to criticize a sitting president when you are not the one in the Oval Office, when you are not responsible for the decisions that must be made and for the whole of the nation. I thought of that when I heard the daily rants from the campaign trail. It got so that even the weather seemed to be George's fault. And I wondered if Barack Obama, who spent far more time attacking George than he did his opponent, John McCain, would want to amend his words once he discovered the reality of the White House and was himself confronted by the challenges and crises that hit a president every day, all day.

There is also a larger picture to consider. No one, not even a president, is going to make the right decision every time. Presidents may have more information on which to base their decisions, but they do not have the benefit of hindsight. They must be prepared to take risks for what they believe is right. And they must try to antic.i.p.ate the future, not just two years or four years out but what the consequences will be decades ahead.

George believes, and I believe as well, that the presidency is larger than the men who are in it. The Founding Fathers, who in the spring of 1787 wrestled with this issue, designed it that way. Each president's responsibility is to the office, the sole national inst.i.tution that speaks for all Americans, regardless of their party or cla.s.s or home or age.

George always believed that it was his responsibility to treat the office with great care.

Presidents are not always right, but history tells us that our core values are right and that our country is good. Those are the values that guided George, the touchstone by which he measured what he did. George knew that in the heat of the moment, presidents tend to get much of the blame and little of the credit. Not all of his decisions would be popular, but as a nation, we would not want our presidents to make decisions solely on the basis of their personal popularity, or poll numbers, or daily headlines. The challenges we face are too great for that.

I am proud that, as president, George acted on principle, that he put our country first and himself last.

Just as the financial crisis was roiling America, the surge in Iraq was cementing some of its largest gains. Iraq, which had once been cited as a failure, was becoming a far less violent, far more peaceful and stable place. It was not perfect, but it had an opportunity to build a better, healthier society, and perhaps in time, ten or twenty-five years from now, it would help transform the Middle East into a more peaceful region.

The loneliest of George's decisions, the surge had been the right choice. But ironically, drowned out by the din of a political campaign, Iraq's success was pushed out of the headlines, if it was mentioned at all.

I never visited Iraq, one of my genuine regrets from my time in the White House.

I did spend several years working on a project to open a children's hospital in Basra; Iraqi children have one of the highest incidences of pediatric leukemia in the world, likely caused in part by Saddam Hussein's use of chemical weapons, and their need for care was great. But the location chosen for the hospital was for years a high security risk. There were lengthy delays, and when I left the White House, the state-of-the-art facility had still not opened. There are, however, many moments at which I could look back with pleasure and a bit of pride. I had worked to support better education and women's rights and human rights around the globe, and I had worked to better people's lives here at home. I had reached out to victims of oppression in Burma and to tattooed American teens struggling to break free from the cycle of gang violence. I had sat on mud floors in African health clinics and inside Bedouin-style tents for breast cancer survivors. I had visited seventy-five countries, including five trips across Africa and three to Afghanistan.

I had been to many of the countries hardest hit by AIDS and malaria. I had held the hands of the dying and looked into the eyes of children who had been orphaned in the most hideous ways, as well as children who were raising other children younger than themselves. Yet amid heartbreak and horror, I had seen individual miracles. I saw how medicines or simple bed nets were giving millions of people a new lease on life. I had met Burmese who were still able to dream of freedom, and Afghan women who were proud to earn an education. I had seen the worst of man in the 9-11 attacks and the worst of nature in Katrina. But I had also seen the very best of America in the hundreds of thousands of people who had put their lives on hold to help the victims and to help our country rebuild. I witnessed the compa.s.sion of strangers comforting, clothing, and feeding those in need. I had seen young men and women abandoned by their parents choose to raise their own children in love. I had been blessed to meet and to know many of the bravest men and women the world has ever seen, our soldiers, Marines, airmen, sailors, and Coast Guard men and women.

At home and abroad, I was inspired by stories of resilience. I could think of Doris Voitier in St. Bernard Parish, who was determined to keep her promise of an open school for her students after the ravishes of Katrina, or of Habiba Sarabi in Bamiyan, Afghanistan. I could think of military families whose grandfathers, fathers, and now daughters and sons wore our nation's uniform. My greatest keepsakes and treasures from the White House are the people, the ordinary yet so very extraordinary people I met, day after day, week after week.

Inside the White House, I had helped restore five historic rooms and refurbish over twenty-five rooms in the residence for future families. At Camp David I had worked on redecorating the cabins with privately raised funds; many of the buildings were now more than half a century old. Foreign leaders had been staying in a cabin where the front hall looked directly into the bathroom. It was a pleasure to make them comfortable. We gathered a historical archive of photos capturing famous visits to Camp David so that every president from FDR forward and numerous foreign leaders are remembered and recognized. I helped to renovate the James S. Brady Press Briefing Room, which had last been modernized in 1981. Every seat now has Internet access and energy-efficient lighting. I worked on updating the Cabinet and Roosevelt rooms in the West Wing. In the White House, George and I had hosted over fifteen hundred social events; many were to award medals or honor accomplishments or great moments in American arts and literature. With Jim Billington I had started the National Book Festival, which now draws some 120,000 visitors each fall, and I had worked to combat illiteracy worldwide. I had done what I had hoped to do: I had worked to be a good steward of the White House for our nation. Every day, even the difficult ones, had been a privilege.

In October of 2008, I was finally able to travel to the Laura Ingalls Wilder house in Mansfield, Missouri, where she and her husband had settled on Rocky Ridge Farm.

I had long wanted to visit the last home of the woman whose Little House on the Prairie stories I had grown up with and had spent hours reading to my own daughters.

From the Laura of those books and her family, I relearned the lessons that no matter how impoverished the lives of those on our frontiers, they were rich in character and strength and love. I proudly presented the home and museum with a certificate from the National Trust for Historic Preservation designating it an official project of Save America's Treasures. One of the great treats I had as first lady was the chance to visit the homes of some of my favorite authors--Mark Twain's residence in Hartford, Connecticut; Carl Sandburg's home, Connemara, in Flat Rock, North Carolina; and Edith Wharton's Lenox, Ma.s.sachusetts, home, the Mount. In the case of the Mount, preservation work has been vital to save it from closure and decay. Today it is a thriving place, honoring one of America's best female writers.

In November, as the banking system began to stabilize after its near collapse, George hosted a world economic summit, where there were so many foreign leaders that the White House had to place the translators in a tent on the roof of the East Wing, with wires running through the bottom of the residence and up into the State Dining Room, so everyone could hear what was being said simultaneously. Thirteen languages were spoken at the dinner, and the arrivals alone took close to an hour, because each head of state had to arrive and receive the same recognition of protocol.

December brought the renewed joys of Christmas. I chose a red, white, and blue theme to honor our country during this election year. We recycled many of the decorations from previous seasons, turning old towering Nutcracker statues into flagwaving Uncle Sams; even Santa wore red, white, and blue. We sent ornaments to every member of Congress and asked each representative to select a local artist to decorate them. Three hundred and sixty-nine returned, decorated with paint, fabric, beading, and images of our varied regions.

Mother came for that last Christmas, and as she had done in previous years, she pulled a chair to the very top of the residence stairs and listened to the beautiful sounds of the carolers and bell ringers as their voices and music rose and echoed off the marble below. Each year, aside from the formal parties, we opened the White House on December afternoons and weekends to members of Congress and their guests and every person on the White House staff; we did the same for hundreds more across the government. They were invited to tour the house with family and friends, and we asked choirs and orchestras and carolers from around the nation to perform as the guests walked among the decorations, the garlands, and the trees. Those were the sounds that Mother so loved.

But it was too much for her to spend Christmas Day with us at Camp David. The prospect of getting her from the cabin to the lodge in the cold and ice was too daunting.

With a knot of regret, I let her return home to Midland. But we did have our girls and the entire Bush family--George's parents, his siblings, their spouses and children. It would be our last gathering at Camp David, "Camp" as we called it, the place where George's sister, Doro, had married Bobby Koch at the end of Gampy's term. When he left office, she had a.s.sumed she would never see Camp again. Instead, when George was inaugurated, Doro was issued a standing invitation to come with us, not just for the holidays but for any weekend.

It was the season for good-byes. George was busy with departure photos for the staff. But he insisted upon adding something else. He invited everyone who worked at the White House--the butlers, the painters, the ushers, the telephone operators, the secretaries, every White House employee--to come to the Oval Office for a photo. And they came, these wonderful people who had been such an important part of our lives for the past eight years. Some had worked at the White House for four decades but had never before been invited into the Oval Office. They entered with tears in their eyes.

We would also be leaving not just close staff but true friends. George's second chief of staff, Josh Bolten, had been a steadfast guiding presence during the difficult months of the Iraq surge and through the economic crisis. He had been with George since 1999, the earliest days of his presidential run. Josh is a fine person, with a wonderful sense of humor and a great and versatile mind. We had treasured his company, and that of his longtime girlfriend, Dede McClure, on our Camp David weekends.

My own staff had a special place in my heart. I remained very close with Andi Ball, my first chief of staff. My second, Anita McBride, had become a confidante and a cherished friend. She and my other staff members had been instrumental in so many accomplishments. Our lives were interwoven far beyond the walls of the office, and it was with real sadness that we watched as this period of shared days came to an end.

Long before the November election, George was determined to make the transition to the new president the most seamless in history. He created a Transition Coordinating Council, to ensure that "each office was left in better shape than when our administration had arrived." It was part of George's interest in the continuity of government, and it was also because we knew how vital a smooth transition is, particularly given the ever-present threat of terrorism and the challenges to the economy.

He believed that one of the paramount responsibilities of the president is to do all that he or she can for the next occupant of the Oval Office. Every White House department was instructed to prepare detailed briefing binders for its successors. In my office, the projects team left behind detailed lists of all their contacts at federal agencies, as well as timelines for events and even for producing the White House Christmas card. The correspondence shop left binders filled with sample letters, and we left scheduling information as well.

And that practice was repeated across all parts of the administration. The Social Office gathered hundreds of pages of instructions, timelines, and sample invitations to leave behind detailed information for their successors. The same was done for Homeland Security, national security, economic policy, commerce and trade, everywhere that there would be a new team. Because this was also the first presidential transition during a period when the nation was under terrorist threat, the White House held a full Homeland Security exercise, a mock attack on major city subways, bringing together the outgoing and incoming administrations, including National Security Advisor Steve Hadley and his successor, General James Jones, and Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and his successor, Arizona governor Janet Napolitano, as well as Fran Townsend, the longserving a.s.sistant to the president for Homeland Security and counterterrorism, so that there would be full continuity for the government and for the American people.

Barack and Mich.e.l.le Obama came to visit the White House, and while George and the president-elect met in the Oval Office, I gave the next first lady a tour. Upstairs I showed her the dressing room window, with its view across the Rose Garden and into the West Wing, and told her the story of my mother-in-law first pointing it out to Hillary Clinton sixteen years before. I also invited her to come back with her daughters and her mother. She did, in December, and Jenna and Barbara came to show the girls the parts of the house that they had always found the most fun.

As in so many years past, Inauguration Day 2009 was cold. It was also historic, as the nation swore in its first African-American president.

After the inaugural ceremony, we made our last walk down the steps of the Capitol with the Obamas; inside Marine One, Bar and Gampy were waiting, so that they could join us for the final helicopter ride to Andrews Air Force Base, where nearly one thousand of our staff and friends were waiting to bid us a fond farewell.

The love of the Bush family had come full circle; the pride George had felt for his parents, they felt in return for their son. They too had made this journey we were about to begin and had found unexpected joys in the years beyond.

As the helicopter rose over the Capitol, George took my hand. We looked at the

city below and out into the vibrant blue January sky, toward home.

Prairie Chapel Mornings George and me, Crawford, Texas, 2009.

(Photo (c) David Woo) Late that January afternoon in 2009, we stopped in Midland, where George spoke to a cheering crowd. We had left from Midland to travel to the White House; it was fitting that it be our destination on the journey home. Thirty thousand people were waiting for us on the downtown square. George thanked them for welcoming us. "I am grateful that you all came out," he said, "and I am thankful that I had the honor of being president of the U.S. for eight years," noting that we all offer Barack Obama "our prayers for his success." As the afternoon faded, he said, "The days have been long, but the years are short," adding, "This guy who went to Sam Houston Elementary spent the night in Buckingham Palace.

"The presidency," George said, "was a joyous experience, but nothing compares with Texas at sunset." He paused briefly, then spoke. "It is good to be home." From there our plane carried us to Waco, where four thousand more of our cheering friends lined the edges of the runway.

On that plane ride home to Texas were many of the staffers who had served with us--Josh Bolten, Andy Card, Karl Rove, Karen Hughes, Andi Ball, and Anita McBride-and also our lifelong friends. From Waco we headed to our ranch with a few of our closest friends. We reached our land, Prairie Chapel Ranch, in the dark. Barbara was with us; Jenna had to return to Baltimore, Maryland, to teach the next morning. George parked his mountain bikes in the garage, and we unloaded the luggage. I was struck by the stillness. There were no staff members, no briefers, no military aides. The grounds were quiet, except for the rustle of the Texas winter wind, the murmur of our own voices, and the soft shuffle of our feet on the crushed stone.

The next morning we were up, as we always are, before dawn, and for the first time in eight years, George made the coffee himself before he brought it into our bedroom.

Outside, as the day broke, our land was the color of dull wheat, and the prairie gra.s.ses were dry and brown, waving in the wind. The sky, when the sun rose behind the clouds, was a leaden gray, wrapping snug above us and beautiful in its repose. We could drive out and see cattle grazing in our pastures, hear the water rus.h.i.+ng down in the canyons. We saw where we wanted to plant blackberry vines and where the bluebonnets would begin blooming in the spring. We gazed upon the spot where Jenna and Henry were married; each morning from our kitchen table I can see the warm glow of the limestone cross where they exchanged their vows.

There are still physical reminders at Prairie Chapel Ranch of our eight years in the White House: Secret Service watch huts remain scattered around the edges of our house, and a giant treetop enclosure, a place where sharpshooters once paced, scanning the perimeter for trouble, stands draped in vines. Someday it might make a wonderful fort for a grandson or granddaughter.

And there are other reminders. We live behind gates now; our Dallas house has one at the end of its curving block. Until the gate was installed, carloads of the curious would wind down our dead-end street, running their tires over our neighbors' lawns, to get a glimpse of our new home. Bar and Gampy faced the same problem when they returned to Houston, and the Texas legislature pa.s.sed a special law allowing gates to be installed on the residential streets of former presidents. George and I are the secondgeneration beneficiaries.

At home our pace of life has hardly slowed; after the White House, requests and invitations continue unabated. There are many days when, just as during the presidency, nearly every minute is accounted for. We live by the block schedule, a 6:00 a.m. flight to Florida or Pennsylvania, and then on to Minnesota or Indiana. I am asked to give speeches and to serve on charitable advisory boards, like that of the Salvation Army or of the Smithsonian's new National Museum of African American History and Culture; George speaks, works on building his presidential library and inst.i.tute, and has joined with Bill Clinton to coordinate a national relief effort for earthquake-ravaged Haiti. There is much meaning and purpose to be found in a postpresidential life.

I am aware, though, that a completely normal life remains just out of reach. At the airport with my mother, well-wishers ask for pictures, and I stop to smile underneath the dangling Hertz Car Rental sign. In restaurants, in pa.s.senger terminals, amid the shelves of a bookstore, strangers approach me like long-lost friends, or rotate their heads to offer up smiles, second glances, or polite stares. At times I wonder when this curiosity will fade, when the novelty of our lives will diminish, and George and I will occupy more of the background.

I wonder too about the pa.s.sions that seem to be so permanently entrenched in all sides of American politics, where elected officials become near instantaneous celebrities, and crowds are expected to swoon as teenagers once did for the Beatles almost half a century ago. Celebrity is a particularly poor model for politics. At the White House, there is no off-season hiatus or a director to yell, "Cut, that's a wrap." The demands of not just the nation but of the world are fierce and unrelenting. I am certain that all presidents have moments when they simply ask G.o.d, "Please do not let anything happen today."

We have lived through four seasons now on our ranchland, a spring bloom of wildflower carpets and flowering p.r.i.c.kly pear; the baking heat of summer, when the air s.h.i.+mmers and even the cicada whine slows to accommodate the stifling air; a fall of crisp mornings and brilliant colors; and a winter when at night we can hear the howls of the coyotes and the rush of biting prairie winds. Four seasons. Hardly enough time to reflect on eight years, let alone a lifetime. When I was born, there was a blacksmith shop on one of Midland's main streets; today, our news is disseminated via blogs.

But each morning, when I watch the sun lift itself over our eastern hill, cutting through the tree line and illuminating the gentle prairie gra.s.ses and the two young shade trees that our White House staff gave to us, I am reminded of the joy to be found in the day that is coming. George will soon open his presidential library at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. The George W. Bush Inst.i.tute is already functioning, and as part of that, I am pursuing many of the causes that were especially dear to me in the White House. I am eager to continue to advocate for women's rights and women's health.

Through a special women's initiative, I have begun working on new ways to help the women of Afghanistan and the Middle East and to promote education and literacy for the millions to whom alphabets are a mystery and basic addition a complex puzzle. And through the inst.i.tute, we will help to promote basic human freedoms for these women and their families.

But as much as I treasure my public life, I also treasure the quiet of my private one.

Sometime during that first spring and summer back in Texas, I began to feel the buoyancy of my own newfound freedom. After nearly eight years of hypervigilance, of watching for the next danger or tragedy that might be coming, I could at last exhale; I could simply be. When I raise my eyes to the sky, it is to see the drift of the clouds, the brightness of the blue, or the moon and the ever-s.h.i.+fting arrangement of the stars.

"Look up, Laura," I can still hear my mother say, with a hint of awe and wonder, and I do.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.

Before the first sentence of this book was written, my family was there. I am deeply blessed to have the love of my husband, George, and my daughters, Barbara and Jenna, and Jenna's husband, Henry Hager. They enrich my life beyond words. And I am grateful for their thoughts, suggestions, and encouragement throughout this process. Most of all, I am grateful for their presence and comfort, for the affection that we share, and for the gift of being able to share my life with them.

My mother lovingly reached into the depths of her memory for stories of the past, and on the Bush side, I have a wonderful, sprawling family to call my own. To my friends, thank you for your steadfast role in my life, for all that we have shared, and for the journey we have taken together.

I was a bit wary about embarking on a book, a memoir in particular, but I am immensely fortunate in having the very best guides. I am especially grateful to Lyric Winik, who helped me put my story into words. Lyric is a talented and beautiful writer who worked tirelessly, logging thousands of airline miles and many hours away from her patient husband, Jay, and their two boys, Nathaniel and B.C. I cherished our conversations about everything from growing up in Midland to life at the White House, and I will miss working with her. She is a dear friend.

My thanks to Bob Barnett of Williams & Connolly, whose judgment and advice are without peer. He is a terrific advocate. At Scribner, I could not have asked for a better team than Publisher Susan Moldow and Editor in Chief Nan Graham. Both of these talented women share my deep love of language, literature, and storytelling. From beginning to end, they have masterfully nurtured this book, and it has been a pleasure to work with them and the rest of the Scribner team, including Paul Whitlatch, Rex Bonomelli, Brian Belfiglio, and Rosalind Lippel.

Emily Kropp Michel has been outstanding and invaluable as a researcher, locating doc.u.ments and other materials that were essential to writing this book and fact-checking.

She did it all with consummate professionalism and good cheer.

Peter Rough was helpful with checking and coordinating specific materials from the White House years. My thanks to the archivists at the George W. Bush Presidential Library, led by Alan Lowe, particularly Tally Fugate, who located well over one thousand doc.u.ments, and Jodie Steck, who searched through vast databases of photos. I especially wish to thank William G. Allman, the White House curator, who shared his rich knowledge of White House history and artifacts with me during my tenure as first lady.

A significant portion of this book centers on the White House, and there I was deeply appreciative of Lynne and d.i.c.k Cheney, who have served our nation with devotion and are valued friends. I was fortunate to have two terrific chiefs of staff. Andi Ball came with me from the Texas governor's office to the White House, where she remained for the first four years. She was with me for the events of 9-11 and the challenging days that followed, and her warmth and good humor were a welcome presence in the East Wing. I treasure her friends.h.i.+p. Anita McBride, who served for my last four years, was instrumental in so many accomplishments. She embraced the toughest challenges and destinations--Afghanistan, Africa, and the Burmese border--and I am grateful for her service, counsel, and special friends.h.i.+p. I am indebted to my wonderful personal a.s.sistants in the White House, Lindsey Knutson and Sarah Garrison, for being at my side every minute on the road and at home.

Andy Card and Josh Bolten, chiefs of staff to George, are two of the finest individuals we have known. I have benefited greatly from the wise counsel of Karen Hughes, Karl Rove, and Harriet Miers.

I want to thank the members of my staff who worked long hours in the East Wing, particularly Anne Heiligenstein and Sonya Medina, who were instrumental in developing the policy behind my initiatives and worked closely with the West Wing on many of our efforts. Ably a.s.sisting them over the years were Maria Miller Lohmeyer, Kristin Mende, Page Austin, and many others to whom I am grateful. Good writers and my longtime friends, Joan Doty and Sarah McIntosh, served as the staff elders guiding many of the young aides and wrote charming doc.u.ments and letters, including penning hundreds of hilarious replies from Barney and Miss Beazley. Year after year, my skilled press secretaries smilingly braved the media whirlwind. I'd like to thank Sally McDonough, Susan Whitson, Gordon Johndroe, and Noelia Rodriguez. My hardworking speechwriters helped ensure that I always said the right thing: Nikki McArthur, Meghan Clyne, Ed Walsh, Elizabeth Straub, and Charlene Fern. On my staff, I'd also like to thank the dedicated Melanie Jackson, January Zell, Quincy Crawford, Deanna Ballard, and the other young people who worked in the East Wing, who served both the White House and their country. I had many great people, including many volunteers, who worked for me as advance people, traveling the country and the world to scout sites and prepare for visits, and I appreciate their days of hard work. I'm appreciative too of the White House photographers--especially Susan Sterner, Moreen Is.h.i.+kawa Watson, Joyce Boghosian, and Shealah Craighead--who expertly captured our eight years through their lenses.

At the White House, we had three elegant and outstanding social secretaries, Cathy Fenton, Lea Berman, and Amy Zantzinger, who, with their very able staffs, planned fabulous events and paid attention to every detail, from working with the West Wing, Secret Service, and the Military Office to standing near us for every hour of receiving lines. They were responsible for many treasured and memorable events and evenings throughout George's presidency.

I'd also like to thank the directors of the White House Visitors Office, Clare Pritchett, Sara Armstrong, and Amy Allman, who along with their staffs coordinated the Easter Egg Roll, managed every tour and the Christmas open houses, and worked with all 535 congressional staffs to arrange const.i.tuent tours. And I spent many great hours with five terrific young men, Israel Hernandez, Logan Walters, Blake Gottesman, Jared Weinstein, and David Sherzer, George's personal aides, who traveled with us and have become like family.

In the White House residence, I wish to thank the many wonderful people who took care of George and me every single day, the ushers, led by Gary Walters, who served four presidents and devoted a large part of his life to the White House, lovingly caring for the home and the families who reside there. We also thank current chief usher Rear Admiral Stephen Rochon, Dennis Freemyer, Daniel Shanks, Claire Faulkner, Worthington White, and Nancy Mitch.e.l.l. We recall fondly Dale Haney, who cared for the beautiful gardens and expertly looked after Spot, Barney, and Miss Beazley. Thanks to the great White House butlers and our dear friends William Carter, James Ramsey, Von Everett, Ronald Guy, George Hannie, Cesar Rodas, and the late Smile Saint-Aubin. We were also appreciative of the great valets, Sam Sutton, Fidel Medina, and Robert Favela, for their kind and constant service to the president and our family. We had an excellent White House physician, Dr. Richard Tubb, and caring doctors and nurses. My thanks also to Tom Driggers of the White House Communications Agency, particularly for his generous a.s.sistance during our yearly hiking forays. I appreciate the hard work of the calligraphers, especially Debra Brown. Thanks to the doormen, who we saw first in the morning and last in the evening, Vincent Contee, Wilson Jerman, Jay Warren, and the late Harold Hanc.o.c.k, and the housekeeping staff, including Mary Arnold, Silvia da Silva, Ivanez da Silva, Annie Brown, and Steven Gates. The floral shop, led by the remarkable Nancy Clarke, and also Robert Scanlan and Keith Fulgham, made a beautiful home more beautiful. We had a talented kitchen staff, led by the lovely chef Cristeta Comerford, and a.s.sisted by Tommy Kurpradit, and in pastry, the creative skills of Roland Mesnier, then William Yosses and Susan Morrison. And we were fortunate to have a myriad of operations personnel, painters, carpenters, plumbers, engineers, and electricians who saw to the care of the White House.

Finally, my lasting thanks to the wonderful Maria Galvan, who has for years been a faithful companion and friend.

At Camp David, we received great care from camp commanders Captain Charles Reuning; Captain John Heckmann; Captain Robert McLean, III; Captain Michael O'Connor; and RDML Michael Giorgione; as well as the Navy chaplains CDR Stanley Fornea, CDR Patrick McLaughlin, and CDR Robert Williams. George and I are grateful to all the men and women at Camp David for their service to our country.

During my tenure as first lady, I had terrific partners.h.i.+ps with many individuals, starting with Dr. James Billington, the Librarian of Congress. Together, with the help of his a.s.sistant JoAnn Jenkins and my staff, we established the National Book Festival, highlighting many of our nation's best authors and the great inst.i.tution of the Library of Congress. The festival remains today as a favorite of book lovers. I enjoyed working with many talented administration officials and good friends on key issues, including secretaries of state Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell, secretaries of education Margaret Spellings and Rod Paige, secretaries of the interior Dirk Kempthorne and Gale Norton, Homeland Security secretaries Tom Ridge and Michael Chertoff, and secretaries of defense Donald Rumsfeld and Robert Gates. Their staffs worked with mine on initiatives for women abroad, the environment, education, and Helping America's Youth, among others. A special thanks to the directors of the National Park Service, Mary Bomar and Fran Mainella, and the National Park Foundation's past president, Vin Cipolla, as well as the many park rangers and staff who were so helpful.

I particularly enjoyed my partners.h.i.+p with our nation's cultural agencies, led by Dana Gioia of the National Endowment for the Arts, Bruce Cole of the National Endowment for the Humanities, and Robert Martin and Anne-Imelda Radice, who directed the Inst.i.tute of Museums and Library Services. I also want to thank John Nau, chairman of the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation; d.i.c.k Moe of the National Trust for Historic Preservation and Save America's Treasures; Henry Moran, the executive director of the President's Committee on the Arts and Humanities; and the committee's terrific past president and my good friend, Adair Margo. Thanks to Dr.

Elizabeth Nabel of the National Inst.i.tute of Health's National Heart Lung and Blood Inst.i.tute and the Heart Truth Campaign. On Afghanistan issues, my thanks to Paula Dobriansky; the members of the U.S.-Afghan Women's Council; Dr. Phyllis Magrab, the council's vice chair; and Georgetown University, where the council now resides. Many thanks also to Sarah Moten for her work with me in Africa.

Since 2003, the Laura Bush Foundation for America's Libraries has provided grants to school libraries across the nation to purchase books. In 2005 leading board members began a separate initiative to help rebuild devastated school library collections following the hurricanes. My heartfelt thanks to Pamela Willeford, the chair, and to the Leaders.h.i.+p Council of the Laura Bush Foundation, J. W. Marriott Jr., chair; Ruth Sharp Altshuler; Chris Boskin; John H. Bryan; Delphine Daft; Annette Kirk; Frederic Malek; Lowry Mays; Marshall B. Payne; Lee Scott; John F. Smith Jr.; and Judi Hadfield. I also thank the foundation's advisory committee--who read the thousands of grant applications, make school visits, and conduct workshops for librarians--Jose Aponte, Dr. Eliza Dresang, Dr. Gary Hartzell, Marilyn Joyce, Dr. Larry Leverett, Dr. James Maxwell, Dr.

Barbara Stein Martin, Dr. Timothy Rex Wadham, Julie Walker, Dr. Junko Yokota, Barbara Correll, and Dr. Yunfei Du, the technical adviser.

A number of individuals and inst.i.tutions provided key a.s.sistance in preparing this book for publication, including Chris Michel in the Office of George W. Bush; the Honorable Stephen Hadley; Amba.s.sador Zalmay Khalilzad; Senator Judd Gregg; Jo Shuffler; Mary Jones, chief of staff of the Senate Rules Committee; Harry Ogg and the library research staff of the Midland County Public Library; Judy Bezjak, historian of the 555th Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion; Leslie Meyer of the Petroleum Museum in Midland, Texas; Brent Gla.s.s, director of the National Museum of American History, and his curators; Ernie Allen of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children; Jim Wallwork; the Office of the President's Malaria Initiative; Amba.s.sador Mark Dybul; Tonia Wood and Jessica Tucker of the Texas State Library and Archives; Colonel Gregory Woods of the White House Military Office; and John Meyers.

Finally, I am grateful to my dedicated current staff; to my chief of staff, Charity Wallace, who spent eight years working in the administration, many of them as the director of my advance team, where her hard work and commitment were invaluable; as well as to my personal aide, Molly Soper. Their excellent work and dedication to this project have been invaluable. My special thanks to them and to everyone else who contributed to bringing this book to fruition.

BIBLIOGRAPHY.

Numerous books, articles, and papers were consulted during the course of preparing this book. The most significant books are listed below. In addition, I relied heavily on my private papers and the block and daily schedules from my office as First Lady of the United States and First Lady of Texas, as well as schedules and papers from the presidency of George W. Bush. I am particularly appreciative that Andi Ball and Anita McBride, my two chiefs of staff, shared their private notes and papers with me during the preparation of the ma.n.u.script, as did others on my White House staff, including press secretaries Susan Whitson and Sally McDonough and my then-director of advance, Charity Wallace. Also Lea Berman, Amy Zantzinger, Lindsey Knutson, and Amy Allman shared their own private notes and materials. In addition, United Nations and UNICEF studies on Afghanistan provided useful background information. And the powerful and detailed reporting of the New Orleans Times-Picayune Times-Picayune was particularly was particularly helpful in refres.h.i.+ng my memory on Katrina and its aftermath.

A note as well for future researchers: significant parts of the overall presidential timeline from 9-11 and a few parts of the timeline from Katrina are incomplete. The 9-11 Commission cited in its final report its concerns with record keeping for the location of the president and other key government officials on that day, and in fact some time logs kept that day have up to a one-hour discrepancy. In addition, human memory is faulty.

Senator Ted Kennedy, Senator Judd Gregg, and I all independently recalled spending hours together at the U.S. Senate that morning. In fact, the entire time was about one hour or slightly less, according to the best estimates of the reconstructed official logs.

George's presidency was also the first electronic presidency, meaning that its doc.u.ments were all electronically archived, but in some cases, during my travels, I added unscheduled stops that were not always noted on the original logs. Where there are differences with the official trip logs, this book should be considered as the definitive source."Ancestry of Laura Welch Bush, First Lady of the United States of America."