Life lessons from Susie Wilson’s memoir
By Pam Hersh
The Garden Theatre audience members, who braved the biting cold to see a movie on Jan. 10, applauded at the end of the movie — and it wasn’t because the theater was well heated.
Rather, they were on fire from the passion and inspiration generated by the movie “Selma.” Several hours later, I, in an audience of one propped up by pillows on my bed, applauded again. This time the inspiration was the book “Still Running,” a just-published memoir by 85-year-old Princeton resident Susie Wilson.
I had no doubt when I started the book that I would be inspired by the literary endeavor undertaken when my friend Susie was 83 years old. She has had a fascinating past, continues to have a fascinating present, and looks forward to a fascinating future.
However, I had no idea that the one anecdote leading to my spontaneous applause would be a simple story about a trip. In May 2013, she took her son Dwight, and grandson Eli, then a first-year student at Rice University, on a Civil Rights Milestones trip. The itinerary included Selma, Alabama, and a walk on the Edmund Pettus Bridge, where activists were tear-gassed and clubbed and kicked on Bloody Sunday — events that were so vividly depicted in the movie I had seen a few hours earlier.
”Travel — whether in my country or a foreign land… has provided worthwhile lessons… “ Susie wrote. “My travels have helped me to see myself as more of a world citizen now. The globe has shrunk immeasurably in my lifetime, and I want to set a good example for my grandchildren by showing them how much I care about it… I’m doing my best to keep abreast of world events and inspire in them (my grandchildren) the desire to immerse themselves in the world, which belongs to its citizens.”
In her book detailing an extraordinary life that included her close friendship with Bobby and Ethel Kennedy, the most memorable and inspirational aspect for me was Susie’s desire to immerse herself in her community — hyper-local and worldwide — with the ultimate goal of improving the lives of others.
And she has made it her job to pass on that sense of responsibility as a citizen in one’s community to her three children and five grandchildren. Considering the state of the world right now with human rights and civil rights issues at the root of recent tragic and horrific events in the United States and abroad, a spring break trip to Selma rather than to Ft. Lauderdale might be something all of us should consider.
The anecdote about the trip came at the end of her memoir, which recounted an exciting and productive life journey, thanks to marrying journalist Don Wilson, meeting Ethel Kennedy, being a college classmate of Jacqueline Kennedy at Vassar, becoming a nationally renowned sex educator and pursuing her avocation of running.
Husband Don Wilson, who died three years ago, had a career that included being a foreign correspondent for “Life” magazine, covering the Korean War and the French-Vietminh War in Indochina. He also was chief of the magazine’s Washington bureau; deputy director to Edward R. Murrow at the U.S. Information Agency; a member of Excom, the committee of 18 top officials who worked with JFK to resolve the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis; and finally corporate vice president of “Time.”
In spite of the many exciting opportunities presented by Don’s career, the friendship with the Kennedys, and the demands of raising her three children, she steadfastly embarked upon a mission to achieve statewide comprehensive sexuality education policy in New Jersey and to lead a national sexuality education organization based at Rutgers University. A skilled journalist, Susie has used her writing skills on behalf of sex-education advocacy, most recently her sex education blog “Sex Matters.”
And then there is her running, which she embraced at age 50, and 17 years later, completed the New York Marathon. Seventeen years after the Marathon, she published her memoir, one wonders what is in store for her when she is 102.
”I liked the democratic nature and simplicity of running; all I needed was a pair of running shoes…,” she says. “Running also suited my tendency toward persistence and perseverance, and I committed myself to it the same way I did to sexuality education — like a dog refusing to give up a bone.”
Even though her narrative about her never-too-old and never-say-never experiences was riveting, the takeaway for me was less experiential and more philosophical. She summarized the moral underpinning of her actions by saying that she has tried to live (the following) words (of Bobby Kennedy):
”Every time (a person) stands up for an ideal or acts to improve the lots of others or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring these ripples build a current which can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”
Those words are from Kennedy’s “Ripple of Hope” speech, given at the University of Cape Town during the “Day of Affirmation.” It was given on June 6, 1966.