Her job is gratifying on many levels, allowing her to utilize her expertise in her chosen field in the most exciting capacity possible. As a member of the president’s staff, she is performing a public service, something that her parents practiced in many ways and ingrained in her as a virtue. And she travels throughout the world, often finding common threads that bind people to each other. During a visit to the Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem, for example, she was moved by a photograph of a well-dressed, impeccably groomed couple who contrasted with the bleak surroundings of their Warsaw ghetto. She heard others comment that it seemed odd for the couple to pay so much attention to their appearance when their lives were at stake. “I had a different reaction,” said Condi. “I said immediately, ‘I understand that photograph. These people are saying, I’m still in control, I still have dignity.’ They are saying, ‘You can take everything from us, including life itself. But you cannot take away our pride.’ “In that concept, Condi saw the pride and dignity with which her mother always dressed in Birmingham, crisp and tailored and beautiful.
Her journeys throughout the world have given her greater appreciation for her own country, in spited of its faults and snail-paced social progress. “As I travel with President Bush around the world and as we meet with leaders from around the world,” she told an audience in 2002, “I see American through other people’s eyes. I see a country that still struggles with the true meaning of multiethnic democracy, that still struggles with how to accommodate, and indeed, how to celebrate diversity. But it’s a country that is admired because…it does struggle to become better. It is not perfect but it is a long, long way from where we were.
She may be far from Titusville on the southwest side of Birmingham, but Condi is not a long way from what she was as individual when she was growing up there. She is still working hard (and probably not playing enough), still taking her piano seriously (even though summer music workshops in Montana are canceled or cut short by White House obligations), still utterly self-confident and optimistic that things are always moving forward and getting better (she did get a job inside the White House that was closed to her when she was ten), and still strong in her faith. She did not have the same challenges as less-privileged black children of Birmingham. The darkness of that time has been a springboard in her life, propelling her to the farthest reaches of her talents and intellect. Like her father before her, she understands that without a struggle there would be no incentive to grow. And like three generations of Rice and Ray before her, she finds glory in that revelation.
Excerpt from CONDI by Antonia Felix
No to mention the disparity throughout the world, Condi has tried her best to build up the universal understanding of democracy promotion. In the position of the least Secretary of State – the first black women to hold nearly the highest position in black American history – she is decidedly strong in her faith since she was raised with strong determination and taught to distinguish between the virtue and vice of blacks by fairly treating every one with respect and equity……SPeak-Peak; July, 07
SPeak”Peak” more to come with how Condi has held the lifelong belief – Twice As Good
