Part of being a successful interpreter is to know a little bit about everything so that you can have a mental schema for any topic that comes your way. Because of this, I have been especially knowledge-hungry the last year - needing to know everything about everything and loving every minute of it. I pause every episode of “Law & Order: SVU” when an unfamiliar acronym pops up. Nate has had to institute a new no-pause rule when we watch “House” for the same reason. My latest obsession, fueled by Nate’s love of history and vast library of presidential and Kennedy-related books is… The Kennedys.

An eight part television mini-series by the appropriate name, “The Kennedys”, made it onto our DVR last month. I was riveted. But of course, I had to take it with a grain of salt. Afterall, this was being produced for entertainment purposes. So I am now diving into a 500+ page book called “Robert Kennedy: His Life” by Evan Thomas and I cannot put it down. I appreciate basically everything about RFK. He is, with Teddy as a close second (and I can’t wait to start reading all about Teddy), my favorite Kennedy. Surprisingly, I can also relate to RFK enormously well. Nate disagrees, but I believe if I were a man and born in 1925, I would have been strikingly similar to him. (That seems like a strange thing to say, but it is truly both a praise and a dig): He is gruff, he is kind, he is courageous, he is edgy, he is patient, he is loving, he is arrogant, he is driven, he pushes the limits of society in pursuit of justice, he sees what needs to be done and does it. He has little tolerance for laziness, for freeloaders, for ignorance, and he goes out of his way to create opportunities for underdogs. Most similarly to me - he can be quiet, reserved, preferring solitude and finding peace in isolation. Throughout school, he was known to be enormoulsy shy and disinterested in social pursuits. I also love his sense of duty, especially to his family, but also his tendancy to pursue other endeavors - politics was never his first choice. He is passionate. Sometimes it comes out in anger and is directed at whoever is in his path. Sometimes it reveals itself in the most beautiful of moments; in the most striking of speeches.

I can’t begin to imagine what our country went through in the 1960s. It’s always been an intriguing time that I love learning about, but learning about Bobby’s life has made me look at it in an entirely new way. When I think about his assassination, I miss him. And yet I never knew him. My heart aches not for what he could have accomplished, but what he could have inspired in others. Change terrifies people. So much so that they turn to violence, and that is how Bobby met his end. But to live a life in pursuit of change, of progress, of justice the way Bobby Kennedy did… that is worth looking back at in awe.