booth gardner - Washington Secretary of State

At TVW’s annual Gala on February 6, 2006, Booth was honored with the Founder’s
Award. He took the stage in a windbreaker and Dockers and commandeered the
microphone from Ralph Munro. His voice had lost its buoyancy and he folded his arms
across his chest in a wooden way, but the monologue was pure Booth. The crowd leaned
forward, listening raptly.
He said he appreciated the award because he was proud of TVW and proud to have
joined so many of them in public service. On the way over on the ferry from Vashon Island
he said he’d struck up a conversation with a grizzled Army veteran:
“Where’d you serve?”
“Vietnam. 3½ years. How ’bout you? – Did you serve in combat?”
“Yeah. Eight years in Olympia!”
Everyone roared. Then he launched into a rambling story about how he loved to
quiz the kids who visited his office. He’d ask if they knew his first name. If they didn’t, he’d
offer a clue: “Where do you go to use a phone?” As for his last name, when a girl seemed
stumped, he said, “What’s your mom do in the spring?” “Sleep!” she said. The audience
howled.
He said a lot of people had heard he had Parkinson’s. Someone was always asking
how he was doing, so he offered an update: He’d been taking the most medicine the
human body could tolerate for more than a decade. “Last year I hit the wall. I’ve been
struggling since then, so I’ve made the decision that I’m going to have brain surgery.” The
crowd grew quiet. “They drill into your head, deep into the brain,” he said, explaining
that only about eight percent of his neurons were still firing on all cylinders. His brain was
suffering from what he called a “leadership” deficit. “The operation will zap ’em, and I’m
guaranteed five good years of life at half the medication if I survive it – and I will survive it.”
The room erupted in applause.
He said he wanted those five good years because he had three goals. One was to
create an alternative to the WASL test as a high school graduation requirement. “Every kid
ought to be pushed to do the best they can,” Booth emphasized. However, many children
have learning disabilities or cultural challenges. Those kids need a chance to “become citizens
of substance, too, because it has to be hard for a kid to go to bed at night knowing he hasn’t
passed the test … when all the scores are going to be in the paper and everybody seems to
be celebrating but him. We need to allow kids more than one way of passing.” They cheered.
Goal No. 2 was to write “a text book” filled with examples and case studies of all
the things he’d learned as an educator and governor. The third goal was the biggest. He
said he’d gone through 70 years of a complicated life being able to make “all the tough
decisions” – how hard to study, which sports to play, where to go to college, who to marry
and how many kids to have. “And I think I ought to have the right to make the last decision
– when it’s time for me to go and how I go. When I got back on my feet, I said to myself
that I was going to make a sincere effort to do something more for the people of this state
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