A Farewell from Outgoing Communications Director Ed Sills, Retiring After 31 Years at the Texas AFL-CIO

Fill your heart with love today

Don't play the game of time

Things that happened in the past

Only happened in your mind

Only in your mind

Oh, forget your mind

And you'll be free

—From “Fill Your Heart,” a quirky Biff Rose/Paul Williams song of my childhood. David Bowie picked it up, inimitably, early in his career, and made it even quirkier: https://bit.ly/41HOKyY

Promises, promises

I'm all through with promises, promises now

I don't know how i got the nerve to walk out

If i shout, remember i feel free

Now i can look at myself and be proud

I'm laughing out loud

—In the lore of Broadway, the Burt Bacharach/Hal David song “Promises, Promises,” from a 1960s musical of the same name, was a two-minute walk-off written for Jerry Orbach, whose character finally resists a corrupt corporate hierarchy in the name of love. The song you were supposed to hum on the way out of the first show I ever saw was “I’ll Never Fall in Love Again,” but the producers quickly noticed audiences left the Shubert Theatre singing the closing number. Dionne Warwick added the rhythmically complex piece to her incredible string of Bacharach hits: https://bit.ly/403D6gE

I adopted the song as a personal anthem well before I decided that a law degree is best used for hanging on the wall. I walked away and have been laughing out loud ever since. 

I am from the Sunday school

I sing soprano in the upstairs choir

You are a holy man

On the F.M. radio

I sat up all the night and watched thee

To see, who in the world you might be

—From “Rainy Night House” by Joni Mitchell, her take on a brief affair she had with another folk music icon, Leonard Cohen. Not about labor, but highly personal to me as one of maybe six dozen songs that persuaded me at a socially inept time that if someone as breathtakingly talented as Joni Mitchell was having a hard time getting romance right, there was hope for the rest of us. Joni forever. Achingly beautiful: https://bit.ly/3VMkpLT

We twa hae paidlet i’ the burn,

Frae mornin’ sun till dine:

But seas between us braid hae roar’d,

Sin auld lang syne.

 

And there’s a hand, my trusty feire,

And gie’s a hand o’ thine;

And we’ll tak a right gude‐willie waught,

For auld lang syne.

—From “Auld Lang Syne,” the traditional song of passage by Scottish poet Robert Burns, used in this space most years I have been here. Translates to: “We two have paddled in the brook, From mornin’ sun till dinnertime: But seas between us broad have roar’d, Since auld lang syne. And there’s a hand, my trusty friend, And give us a hand o’ thine; And we’ll take a right goodwill draft, For auld lang syne.” An upbeat version: https://bit.ly/3VKUjJ2

Happy New Year!

This is my last daily email, more than a quarter century in, ahead of my last work day in the office on Friday. It’s a moment I once dreaded but now see as a door to a new stage and a release.

  What can I say? My beloved godmother used this complimentary close (do they still teach that term?) In her letters: “With a barrel of love and a bushel of kisses,” accompanied by a little drawing of those two items. That’s a great start. For me, the love rests in the millions of words that have made up this endeavor. Aunt Stella got it right, and so did my Mom, who taught me how to write good letters, and so did my maternal grandfather, a lawyer who got me interested in the affairs of the world, and so did my Dad, who made a living by understanding the art of the schmooze. All their love is in the product.

  Mine was the last office at the Texas AFL-CIO dominated by paper and artifacts, and I will spend my remaining couple of days as I have the last few weeks, seeing to it that the paper gets to the right place, whether it’s the recycling bin, the wonderful labor archives at the University of Texas-Arlington, or other places in the office. My office will be cleaned, touched up and figuratively turned into a blank sheet of paper for my successor. The toys, games, gadgets, puzzles and other talismans I brought to the office — having admired Ray Bradbury’s bizarre idea-generating writing setup — have been given away or taken home, where my long-suffering spouse will spend the next few years telling me to get rid of them and I will (partly) comply. If you are ever suspicious that an eBay item looks awfully familiar, the only other option was the trash can. Our office will retain a small reference library that honors labor’s rich history and dates, with great wisdom, to times before the dawn of the Internet.

  Come what may, I leave with a shocking amount of love in my heart. That love has been stoked by the officers and staff here, by well-wishers connected to this daily email, by long years of correspondence with many of you, by a Capitol crowd and especially media corps for whom I did my utmost to practice the Golden Rule, and by my best effort to do right by working people in Texas. I promise you, every bit of the love that came my way is fully reciprocated and then some.

  I am confident you will quickly notice exciting new wrinkles in our comms program in the new year. During the staff retreat, listening to Tara Pohlmeyer’s ideas for the job excited me and set off a light bulb in my head. What struck me most was this: Tara begins as an experienced, exceptionally talented expert in public relations, having spread brilliant messaging for one of the most pro-union members of Congress. 

  I began this job with newspaper experience, skeptical from 12 years on the receiving end of the traditional tools of p.r. For three years, I worked on a contract, “part-time.” When Joe Gunn hired me as a full-time employee, we were a smaller staff, and I quickly saw value in helping out in other departments. Making a modicum of use of my law degree, I began doing substantial work in our legislative program, got handed the job of coordinating the Scholarship Program, and got involved in other troublemaking that played outside the lines of comms work. (I’m far from unique in this regard, and still marvel at Rosa Walker, whose incredibly broad work here was the least definable of anyone’s.) Now, we have a larger Politics and Policy Department, along with newer operations (and older ones that have put new life into pursuits like labor education and field work). No longer is everything “all hands on deck.” Tara’s eyes will be on the prize. 

  Our movement faces some of the greatest challenges ever, both in Austin and in Washington, D.C. But we are equipped to fight, and as we all have shouted at one time or another, “When we fight, we win!” 

  The short way of saying all this is that I feel good about my timing. In a changed world, change is good. The bonus, as noted previously: I’m saying goodbye, but this particular list may endure in some form or fashion. Stay tuned.

  I do not intend to disappear off the face of the Earth, though I do intend to pay attention to matters unrelated to labor comms in the near future. As is the story of my life, I will probably frustrate any plans others might have for me (to the betterment of mankind, I suspect), but I will absolutely stay involved in advocating for working people for as long as I live.

  My gratitude is boundless. 

  First and foremost, I thank Enedelia Obregón, my spouse, for enduring all the years in which our schedules were largely governed by the two-year Texas legislative and political cycle. We met as newspaper reporters and have always understood odd hours and odder obligations, but Enedelia went above and beyond in so many ways in supporting my work. Now it’s her turn. I also thank my children, Alejandro and Graciela, for not just putting up with occasional chaos (though not once in 31 years did our officers fail to clear space for me to attend their big days), but for becoming strong believers in unions themselves. 

  I thank Rick Levy and Leonard Aguilar. They patiently supported me at every turn and gave me the leeway to give what was essentially a one-year notice. And I thank our staff — Emily Amps, Fabiola Barreto, Lee Forbes, Ana Gonzalez, Lauren Guild, Amber Jones, Katie Milne, Lorraine Montemayor, Ixtlani Palomo, Emily Speight, Maria Thomas, and Katy Waters — for their understanding and willingness to fill in gaps as I devoted more and more time to saying goodbye. I thank Tara Pohlmeyer for taking on a comms job — one of the best ones — that feeds one’s soul while offering intricate challenges. At a dinner during our retreat, the staff and I went back and forth around the table, discussing what we mean to one another. I will never forget the love in that room.

  I thank the media corps, which is getting an incredible amount of wrongheaded flack lately and faces real potential for crisis. When I started this job, Texas media coverage that put “labor” and “union” in the same sentence (thank you, Becky Moeller, for that phrase) could have fit into a thimble. Now, we have a representative number of reporters with expertise in labor, thanks in large part to the decision by hundreds of journalists to unionize. By and large, when reporters in Texas tell the story of unions, they do it in good faith and with strong skills. We need more advocacy for the First Amendment, not capitulation, and we must remember that more and more, the media are our Brothers and Sisters.

  Last, I thank you for reading the daily email and constantly assuring me that someone heard this tree falling in the forest. Thank you for putting up with my idiosyncrasies, especially those who don’t like show tunes and music that was popular before you were born, to get some labor news. 

  I have had a hell of a run, in service to the greatest movement on the face of the Earth. The best to you always.

  Contact info: My work email address of ed@texasaflcio.org will expire in a month or two. To stay in touch, please use edsills18@gmail.com