One of the more popular prayers these days goes something like this: “Lord, please help me be the kind of person my dog thinks I am.” In the past few years there probably have been many times when Brian Baird surveyed his congressional obligations and relentless demands on his time and energy and distilled it all down to one desire: to be the kind of man his 4 1/2 -year-old twin sons think he is.
Savor it all, Brian. Your flawlessness is temporary. Trust me; I’ve been there. In about 10 years, when your sons are 14, they might be praying together: “Lord, please don’t let Dad be the kind of guy we think he is.”
For now, Baird’s decision to leave Congress at the end of 2010 is understandable, at least to me. His critics will insist there are other reasons; I’ll leave them to their analyses. But as a father, I’m willing to accept the explanation that twin sons and wife Rachel are all the reasons Baird needs. Well, there’s probably another reason: the outdoors.
Last August the Baird family was romping around a meadow on the flanks of Mount Rainier when the psychologist-politician stopped amid all the magnificence and natural beauty to analyze himself. “I asked myself what makes me happiest, and the answers were my family and the outdoors,” Baird told me in a Friday telephone interview. “Then I asked myself how much time I was spending with those priorities, and what’s good, really, for my soul.”
Running around that meadow was William Washington Baird, named after Brian’s father and America’s first president. Also immersed in play was Walter Franklin Baird, named after Baird’s father-in-law and one of America’s most enlightened Founding Fathers. “I realized I was never going to get any of this time back,” Baird recalled. So he had to make more of it. And that’s when Baird first started thinking about leaving Congress.
Accurate prediction?
Then again, leaving Congress might have entered Baird’s mind much earlier. In a 2006 Columbian story by Kathie Durbin, Baird makes this curiously prophetic comment: “In order to do this job right, you have to be able to walk away from it. If I’m through today, I’m powder skiing tomorrow.” When Baird said that, Will and Walt were 16 months old. One of Clark County’s most visible public figures was learning one of fatherhood’s private joys: Even the worst day at work ends with reading a book to someone who thinks you’re the best person in the world.
Starting in 2011, Baird’s constituency will shrink to just three people. He will trade town hall meetings and caucus-room intensity for mountain hikes and camping trips. Instead of trying to rationalize remarks he wishes he never made, Baird will be showing a couple of boys how to change a flat tire.
Instead of 25-30 round-trip flights a year across the country, Baird will be sea-kayaking around the San Juan Islands with two constituents whose only demand will be to explain the difference between an osprey and an eagle.
Instead of flying to the other side of the world and trying to learn why people have massacred each other for millennia, Baird will be driving to Disneyland and warning “Don’t make me stop this car” while Will complains, “Walt touched me!”
Instead of explaining to Democrats why he actually voted for a constitutional amendment to ban flag-burning, Baird will be telling tousle-haired boys that they need to turn left and not right when they get to first base.
Instead of explaining to Republicans why he opposed a military invasion, Baird will be showing a troop of Scouts how to tie a taut-line hitch knot.
But like voters, sons are fickle. They’ll turn on you. And some day, Baird might learn that “Stay away from my kids!” is not much different than “Keep your kid off my lawn!”
Baird might think the last 10 years were the most exciting years in his life. But if he’s as smart as he seems, and if he has a sense of humor and is willing to let the three people he loves most make fun of him and laugh at him, then the next 10 years will be even better.
Be careful, though. When those guys turn 14, you’ll have some dinner-table spats that’ll make a town hall meeting seem like a picnic.
