Joe Biden's Tears Remembered

As I watched Senator Joe Biden tear up at the tale end of the much ballyhooed vice presidential debate, I had a visceral moment of déjà vu. In case you missed what jump started it, the senior senator from Delaware became momentarily misty-eyed as he refuted the notion that "just because I am a man" he couldn't understand what it's like to wonder whether or not a child would "make it" after a life-threatening accident. Watching him that evening, it was hard not to think about Biden's honorable character and love of family -- especially as we now know his mother-in-law was to die the morning after.

Still, as the campaign comes down to the wire, John McCain and Sarah Palin are doing their very best at character assassination. We've all heard the clips: Palin claiming that Barack Obama "pals around with terrorists" and McCain's newest ad, "Ambition," which out and out calls "that one" a liar. And at a Republican rally earlier in the week, a rally that hinted at a mob lynching, a conservative radio talk show host said to McCain: "It's absolutely vital that you take it to Obama, that you hit him where it hurts. We have all of these shady characters that have surrounded him."

Of course, the "character" closest to Obama -- other than his wife Michelle -- is Joe Biden.

That evening of the VP debate, Biden didn't have to proclaim his "character" -- he simply showed us. He didn't tell us explicitly about the tragic deaths of his first wife Neilia and his 1 year-old daughter Naomi (both his sons were also severely injured in the car accident) just after he had been first elected to the Senate in 1972 and only days before Christmas. But I knew what he was remembering. I knew because, as a 15 year-old in the fall of '72 -- before any of my grandparents died, even before our beloved spring spaniel passed away -- my teenage heart broke to learn of the Biden family tragedy, the first time I began to understand the invisible and random hand of the fates.

Earlier that fall I had campaigned for Senator George McGovern as much as I could after my ninth grade classes ended, going door-to-door in my Queens, N.Y. neighborhood, pasting a ginormous blue and white McGovern sticker across my loose-leaf notebook, and finding myself ridiculed by many for supporting such a "dove" (this was at the height of the Vietnam War).

But in my periphery lay Joe Biden, then the 29 year-old father of three, who fought a tough campaign focused on ending the war in Southeast Asia, the environment, civil rights and, yes, change. On Election Day, Nixon carried Delaware by a landslide, but the young lawyer, along with his wife and trusted partner, won his Senate seat in a huge upset by a mere 3,000 votes.

Only weeks later, wife and daughter would perish and I would write Sen. Biden a note of condolence. Who knows what I wrote because that letter is long gone, but not his response back to me, which arrived later that winter. I've kept it all these 36 years. His letter came in a heavy, cream-colored envelope with the return address, United States Senate Washington, D.C., engraved in dark blue in the left corner. He addressed it to "Mr. Petrow," probably the first time anyone had called me that:

"I offer a belated thank-you for your kind words of condolence. I deeply appreciate your sentiments. I owed so very much to Neilia. She had a talent for making not only her own life worthwhile, but also the lives of those around her. She was both a loving mother and a loving wife. In addition, she was my political confidant, in whose judgment I had implicit and utmost trust. Neilia looked forward to our coming to Washington. Now our life has been completely torn apart by an event I shall never completely understand. Neilia deserved better. Best wishes, Joe Biden"

Image courtesy of the author

Included in the letter were the Mass cards for both Neilia and Naomi. On the back of his wife's card was a quote from Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet: "Death lies on her like an untimely frost upon the sweetest flower of all the field." And on his infant daughter's: "Dear God, What greater thing can be said of Amy than Ezekiel's words: 'As is the mother, so is her daughter.'" -- Ezekiel 16:44

Image courtesy of the author

After his tears, and after the debate, I went into my voluminous files to see if my recollection of Biden's dark days of 1972 matched the honorable and loving family man I had just witnessed on the stage in St. Louis. If my memory had any weakness, it was in not recalling the full promise and shattered life of the freshman senator from Delaware who, in the winter of his own despair, took the time to write a 15-year-old, while taking on his new duties in Washington D.C. and at home in Wilmington as a single father of two. So while McCain and Palin do their best to undermine the Democrats trustworthiness and character, let us praise the family man from Delaware who could and should be our next vice president.

A different version of this article was originally published in the Independent Weekly.

Comments

[flyingmonkey]

who knew I could fall in love with a 67 year old senator?

[dpsalter]

Steven, I too have kept the letter Joe sent me after all these years. I was 13 years old when the accident occurred and wrote a poem in an attempt to answer the "whys" of such a tragedy that I sent to Joe. Thanks for helping me explain to friends why I still get choked up when they ask me about the accident.

[quincyscott]

Tragedy, loss, suffering. These things can bring both the best and the worst out of people. There is no virtue in suffering through tragedy. But how you deal with that situation, what you make of it, tells a hell of a lot about your true colors. I honestly don't know where a guy like Joe Biden found the inner strength to face the unbearable and respond not with anger or despair, but with a renewed sense of love and duty. I do not cry all that easily, but I definitely shed some tears during the VP debate, and again just now while reading this touching post. I myself have a son about Naomi's age, and can hardly imagine how painful losing him, or my wife, would be.

I am forty-one, and have never felt the kind of affection for any political leader that I feel for Barack Obama and for Joe Biden. Yes they are smart, talented politicians. Eloquent. Professional. Grownups! But these are also authentic, good people. These guys represent America at its best. This seems such a corny thing to say about a couple of pols, but I really believe it to be true.

It pains me to see them, especially Obama, have his character of all things so vehemently attacked. These are men of the highest character, and they make me feel both proud of America and eager to do my part to make my country better.

[joannericec]

I have tears in my eyes as I write this. Thank you so much for what you wrote, Steven. Joe Biden is such a good and decent person. Your post is a wonderful insight into, hopefully, our next VP and a wonderful tribute to his dear wife and little girl.

[EvaCuarse]

thaaanks sooo much! Neighbor! :-) 11375 all the way!

[TheAlchemist]

Thank you for sharing this bit of history. Joe's fine character dates waay back.

[fr3dmars]

Thank you for your touching and eloquent remembrance - it was a delightful reprieve from the fantasy-land uproar of an ugly campaign lurching toward its end.

[jimspy]

Someone on a newsmagazine show once said, "The death of your child is your own death...except that you have to live through it." I have two daughters who just happen to be the pinnacle of creation. Living through their death would be unimaginable to me, let alone the death of my wife. And then to forge ahead with a job as a public servant...I do not possess that strength of character.

And so it is that I admire anyone who does.

Yes, I admire the strength of John McCain to suffer what he did. And I guess it cost him a marriage. But really, I think it cost him much more. For somewhere along the line, McCain's experience caused him to lose his soul.

Joe Biden, on the other hand, seems to have found his.

[kyriana]

My favorite post anywhere during this campaign season. Thank you, Steven, for sharing these pieces of Joe Biden. He is the only statesman to whom I've ever been completely devoted.

I read his letter with tears in my eyes--not just at the lovely words about his wife, but because the wound clearly was so raw when he wrote.

Yes, I am impressed that a senator replied to a 15-year-old, but more so that a 15-year-old thought to send his condolences to a senator. Thanks.

[mimigrammy]

Some questioned Barack Obama's selection of Joe Biden for his running mate, I never did. I have been around long enough to know Joe Biden and his accomplishments as a man, father, husband, son and statesman. When Barack Obama selected Joe Biden, it removed any doubts from my mind that Obama was the right person to lead our country. The character of a man can be measured by the way he treats those with the least who walk amongst him and the women around him for whom he owes his life. Although I never was a supporter of McCain for President, I tried very hard to remain a supporter of McCain as a man, despite his failings with his first devoted wife. However, when he selected Sarah Palin as his running mate, a decision that put us all at peril, and when he brought into his campaign the very men who attacked his wife and children in 2000, he lost my confidence and respect. McCain the man who put politics before country. My enthusiam for Obama and Biden has grown stronger over the many months of this election, but the positive feelings I have always had for John McCain are gone.

[BarbinMilford]

There are so many things in life that connect us to each other, as I read these comments;
I can share with Steve my campaigning for McGovern and my first chance to vote---and the injustice of finding that my voter registration was "lost" along with the rest of the packet of new voters I worked so hard to get---yet it will never discourage me....
The loss of my son Michael four years ago and realizing how precious and fragile life is, especially for your remaining children--so when Joe's voice caught as he spoke of his son it spoke volumes to me, and always will....
After a six hour wait, Joe, Jill, Michelle and Barack did not disappoint us at a rally in Detroit last month---the energy, love and genuine character of these four was electric. It is with a profound knowing in your heart and soul that you are in the presence of greatness, and with that memory I will strive to make the world around me a little better every day......VOTE OBAMA/BIDEN 2008!!! Thank you Steven!

[liseworks]

Great, heartfelt story - thanks for this sobering look at a profound relationship & such a sad loss, ....in the midst of the noise of today's political talking heads ....

[stayinsouth1981]

It amazes me that Mr. Biden could find such eloquence in his deep grief. I hope we will be able to continue to look to him as a wonderful example of grace.

[RexPrimoris]

Thank you for the post...it was very revealing about Senator Biden's good character and genuine decency.

[sstt]

Senator Biden is an honorable man, a loving family man, and a man who even in his darkest times will work for us, the American people. I look forward to seeing him elected as our next Vice President ! Thank you for posting your personal rememberances of Sen Biden and for sharing with us the lovely faces of his first wife and daughter. As a parent who has lost a child, I know that his emotion at the debate was both honest and possibly unexpected...even years later, we can never anticipate what words or circumstance will bring the rush of anguish back to flood our hearts. Blessings for the Biden family !

(did you mean 'tale' in that first sentence, or 'tail' ?)