Ask what you can do

This week I started a new job at the Kennedy School at Harvard University and it has been amazing to learn so far about the depths of departments, layers and levels of administration and governance and yet in some ways, it feels like a village. 

Across its campuses in Cambridge and Allston/Boston, Harvard comprises 5,000 acres, 18,000 employees, and over 20,000 students (6,600 undergrad). For many years, I've been driving or walking through Harvard Square while shopping, or on my way to other things, but I never thought of it as a village of people who have something in common. I never noticed how most every pedestrian you encounter is either a student, faculty or a staff of Harvard.

I've been fascinated with wandering around the HKS building, which sits on a beautiful park facing Memorial Drive next to an elegant white foot bridge that crosses over the river. My friend Art told me that in the 60's, the Kennedy family attempted to build the Kennedy Library in this location, but ultimately it was not approved. The HKS building is undergoing renovations to join its three wings with glass walkways and building a courtyard in the center. I sit in one wing (Littauer) but if I leave my cubicle and walk two feet, I'm in another wing (Rubenstein), both named for significant donors who were also alumni.

The inner child in me (the Judy in me) is very pleased that there's a spiral staircase up and down which I can take anytime I feel like it. : ) I also find it amusing that we are the JFK school on JFK Street, and everything at Harvard also seems to have a three-letter acronym. Everything. Everything. This place seems to be the inventors of sewn-on, monogrammed initials.

Many interesting and important experts in economics, policy, and leadership sit in the offices which I pass through several times a day and I probably won't recognize most of them. I was startled on Monday to run into Luis Moreno Ocampo, the first chief prosecutor for the UN's International Criminal Court in Den Haag. Maybe most people wouldn't recognize him, but Facing History has long acknowledged Ocampo to be one of many Watchers of the Sky, a term that fellow prosecutor and humanitarian Ben Ferencz coined.

I've decided in 2017 to give up facebook becuse it hadn't offered me any emotional or intellectual value for quite some time, and yet, instagram always offers me a soul service: good moods, smiles, laughs or a positive lift in my spirit whenever I log into it. Even if you don't have an account, you can find me on ig using this public link: www.instagram.com/lara_sue and you'll see what's new with me, at least in photographs and short captions.


One of my favorite ig photos recently is this campaign poster for the capital campaign at HKS. They have done a great job joining a call to action with what looks like the colorful sail of a sunfish, referencing the famous quote, "ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country".

When I see this, it motivates me to think about all the ways in life, in all circumstances to ask what you can do.
It reminds me especially of Jesús Colón's mini-essay (which is like a fable), Little Things are Big. Even when someone is struggling with luggage on the bus or waiting in line behind you, looking like they had a really rough day and want to be left alone, you could greet them, smile, or offer a hand.

I also love my colleague's hilarious poster (left) about refraining from audibly sighing. That's applicable!

And finally, I loved this creative bookmark set (below) from Harvard's new Food Literacy Project which is working hard to raise awareness about healthy foods, nutrition, cleaner waste and recylcling practices, and shedding light on all levels of people having access to local, healthy foods with things like the Winter Farmer's Market. I think I am going to try to volunteer with FLP.

It was really hard to leave Facing History and Ourselves which is truly a hero of an organization, and which introduced to me to so many one-of-a-kind human beings and friends. But since I left the nonprofit sector formally, I am determined to volunteer with a couple orgs more than I used to, on a regular basis, and determined to continue going to FH public events as much as I can.