Elizabeth Edwards

I’m sad about Elizabeth Edwards. It’s funny how we feel as if we know public figures personally, so that somehow makes it okay to comment on their lives. I always liked Elizabeth Edwards. She didn’t ask to be a public figure, but she did it graciously despite some of the rough hands that were dealt her.

For whatever reason, I’ve always thought of her as a mom first and foremost. I don’t necessarily think of other famous women who are moms that way. Maybe I think of Elizabeth Edwards as a mom first because she endured what no mom should have to endure – the death of a child. Getting back up after the fates have dealt you that low blow would be close to impossible. But she did it, and she endured.

Then to have cancer and a philandering husband played out on the public stage – isn’t that more than we can expect one person to have to put up with? It’s not as if she asked for any of it, including the celebrity, yet her most private and most painful moments became her most public.

Elizabeth Edwards was an intelligent and strong woman. Whenever I saw her on TV, I got the feeling that I really did know her, or at least would have liked to know her. I don’t feel that way about other famous people…say….Lindsay Lohan or Paris Hilton or any number of others who are fighting for fame for fame’s sake. Elizabeth Edwards didn’t ask for it.

I didn’t know her, but it seems to me that Elizabeth Edwards was a good mom. And I was thinking of her today.