The word, Saudade, is Portuguese. There is supposedly no direct translation - no one word in English - for it.
I think I’ve been feeling it a lot more this year - in different circumstances, both personally and professionally - without being able to describe it. Or maybe I’ve become more conscious of it after a family trip to Portugal last Spring, and it took a little while for the penny to drop.
A particularly acute bout of it hit me over the weekend, driving down Interstate 90 (I-90) on an adventure with one of my sons.
Before we left to chase some Penguins on our adventure, I was reminding myself this was about the journey, not the destination.
In part I think it’s because I had been fortunate over the previous week to see some people who are very important to me, and to helping shape who I’m becoming in life. (Here I admit that despite my 4.5 decades here, I haven’t ‘become’ anything - the Snow Patrol lyric from their song Chocolate is something that reminds me of that): “What have I become? Truth is nothing yet”
One of them recently turned 50, and our discussion centred around our kids, and politics. Our kids are now the ages we were when we met, so there was some obvious parallel to my current-day situation.
After catching hometown hero Sidney Crosby and the Penguins top the Buffalo Sabres on Friday in Buffalo, we were on our way to Pittsburgh to catch another one. We had settled in for a long drive so my son was entertaining himself as I listened to music and podcasts. I looked up at the map on Apple CarPlay, to judge how far until we had to exit, and looking at the map I was transported back in time about 17 years.
The map showed Pittsburgh to the south, and Cleveland straight ahead. The last time I was in Cleveland was in 2005, as part of the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP), run by the US State Department. This program - which some people cynically call “US indoctrination 101” is a learning exchange program designed to build understanding of the US among those in other countries with whom the US has diplomatic relations.
Seeing Cleveland ahead on the map, I knew I was experiencing a strong feeling of Saudade.
In early 2005, I was fortunate to be nominated to undertake the IVLP by then US Ambassador to Canada, David Wilkins, a folksy, charming southerner nominated to his post by then-President George W. Bush.
There were two others on our exchange program that rounded-out our political rainbow coalition (I was then working for the NDP Opposition Leader in Nova Scotia, after working for the NDP Cabinet & Premier of Manitoba) - a Conservative who had worked for former Ontario Premier Mike Harris, and some municipal politicians; and a Liberal who was then working as Executive Assistant to the then-Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty; his name was Arnold Chan.
A little about Arnold.
If you live in or around Scarborough, or work in or around Parliament Hill in Ottawa, you surely recognize his name, and may have counted him as a friend. If not, you might recall his name from his farewell speech(es) to the House of Commons in the Summer and Fall of 2017 - which were covered widely in the mainstream media both for the central message, and the heartfelt way in which they were delivered.
Arnold died on September 14, 2017, after a recurrence of Nasopharyngeal cancer - he was 50 years old. His funeral attracted a lot of public attention, in part due to the tribute given to him there by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
You can watch the full ~32-minute farewell speech by clicking on this video:
If you’re looking for a few of the more poignant moments - around minute 7 he discusses the importance of democracy; around minute 11 he talks about the importance of listening to one another; and, around minute 13, the importance of civility and gratitude.
Of course, twelve years earlier as we embarked on that IVLP trip, we had no idea his journey would end so abruptly, or that his time as a Member of Parliament (MP) would be so brief.
We didn’t become the best of friends on that exchange program in 2005. To be honest, at the beginning I’m not sure either of us was all that convinced that spending three weeks together, travelling across the US, was going to wear well on us.
Our third colleague was a fairly solitary guy, and he opted-out of many of the evening functions and events, so Arnold and I spent a lot of time together. In doing so, we created a connection that I value to this day.
Our program started off in Washington where a Georgetown lecturer - who acted as a translator for President Bush when certain latin american leaders came to town - described the central difference of Canadian and US government philosophy this way:
When civil servants in Canada have policy ideas or innovations, they look around the room and ask one another “how can we implement this?” Whereas, when US government officials have such an idea, they tend to ask themselves “who in the private sector can implement this?”
True, or just accurate, I keep coming back to that statement.
Before leaving Washington we visited with folks at the Canada desk in the US State Department. They told us that while Canada and the US each had many unique international relationships and issues to deal with, and separate domestic issues to attend to, they tended to characterize the Canada-US relationship as being “inter-mestic.”
We left DC and went on to Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio, where we met with scions of the state political elite, economic development officials, city administrators, management consultants and legislators.
At one ‘home hospitality’ dinner, we were being talked-at by Cleveland’s upper-crust, and we had a choice to either politely but efficiently eat our food and move along back to our hotel ASAP, or to engage with them, challenge some of what they were saying, and definitely not make it back to our hotel until very late. We looked at one another, nodded and silently chose the latter. We debated public healthcare, housing policy, progressive taxation and many other things that evening.
Rather than stick to ourselves during much of our unscheduled time, after we had called home and spoken with our partners and kids, we generally fell in with one another and roamed around Cleveland, and then Columbus.
We moved on to Jackson, Mississippi where we arrived less than 90 days after Hurricane Katrina wreaked havoc on the region, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was essentially running everything. We surveyed the devastation, and discussed race relations in the US at the home of a college dean.
The three of us ditched our government minder and stole away for a night to Memphis, Tennessee, eager to visit the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Motel, Graceland and Beale Street. We wanted to see where MLK was murdered, and better understand his journey. Selfishly, I’d loved the song “Walking in Memphis” by Marc Cohn, and I really wanted to see Beale Street. We were awed by all that we took in; and we barely made it back to Jackson the next day in time for our flight to Seattle.
Our last stop on the IVLP was Washington State. We were based out of Seattle, but also visited Redmond - home of Microsoft. In Redmond we explored a mega-church, and met with members of the staff, developing an understanding for its role in the community - and the role of so many of these mega-churches across the US.
We ended our trip there just after US Thanksgiving, and so were invited for ‘home hospitality’ on Thanksgiving day at the home of two long-retired Microsoft employees (who had cashed out early and begun to work on passion projects). We marvelled at the fact they had “his and her libraries” in this vast house.
In the years that followed, our family grew to encompass three boisterous boys - the same as Arnold, and his wife Jean Yip. He sent me a card dated the day after our middle son was born, telling us to “…take the time to enjoy them both (the voice of experience!).”
I’d get notes from him with parenting advice, we’d exchange emails at some political development or other in Nova Scotia or Ontario - and prognosticate about the outcomes of various campaigns. He often said he was deeply-embedded in the work of the campaign(s), and wished he could see his kids more often - but such was the grind of a campaign. I resembled that remark in those years.
When he left political staff life for the private sector, his updates would still be based on his political and public policy passions - friends whose nomination campaigns he was chairing, etc. Then, in 2014 Arnold ran for the Liberal Party of Canada and won a by-election to the House of Commons. He publicly revealed his cancer diagnosis in the months thereafter. He was re-elected in the 2015 federal election.
In 2016, my wife and I were in London for a week, and we got to see Marc Cohn in an intimate concert, along with my cousin Paddy (a clever and talented musician in his own right) and his partner. Cohn’s rendition of “Walking in Memphis” was soulful and transporting, and took place in a beautiful old cathedral. I sent Arnold a note about how the concert brought back memories of our Memphis sojourn. Another reason he was on my mind that day was due to the murder of Labour MP Jo Cox, and the emerging questions around safety of Parliamentarians.
I got to Ottawa often for work during those years and he and I would try and go for breakfast, or supper, when I’d be in town; although his Parliamentary duties would sometimes intervene. It was obvious his condition was worsening, and stoic as he was outwardly, we both knew the “direction of travel”.
We had candid conversations about the impacts government can have on people’s lives, and the strictures that partisanship places on people. At that point I’d been in and out of the Premier’s office, and he’d been a staffer, an opposition MP, and then Deputy Leader of the Government in the House of Commons.
The last time we had supper together was a few weeks before that seminal speech he gave in June 2017. I’m not sure that we both knew for certain, but I think we both had a sense that might be the last time we spoke - in person at least.
Last Saturday, as my son and I drove along the highway and I stared at the map thinking back - a part of me wanted to pull a Michael J. Fox. I wanted to freeze time and head back to Cleveland, circa November 2005.
But this podcast I recently listened to (Not Lost, “Postcard from Portugal”) has more context on the idea of Saudade. It’s not all nostalgia in a sense of sadness, or longing for parts of the past — it’s also about learning from life and those things that may give us pause, cause longing or even grief, and using those as springboards to help appreciate both the present, and the potential of the future.
Just like so many of the relationships we develop in life - planned, serendipitous or otherwise - they often continue to influence us in ways we can’t anticipate or forecast; often long after they’ve ended, or we can no longer see those folks IRL, for whatever reason.
I thought about Arnold as we drove along and wondered about how the tone and tenor of politics these days may deter good people like him from seeking office; and how much poorer we’d all be if that was the case.
As my son and I approached the exit for the I-79, I thought of the card Arnold sent me just after he was born: “…take the time to enjoy them both (the voice of experience!)”.
We turned left, toward Pittsburgh; toward the future.
Post-script: I know many folks in Ottawa and Winnipeg this week are mourning the loss of another MP, Jim Carr; who in my limited direct experience was a kind, straightforward and exceedingly-decent man. Condolences to all who knew and worked with him.