Stirring It Up with Molly Ivins (26 page)

MOLLY RECEIVED MYRIAD HONORS
, as reflected in stacks of engraved plaques. True to her entrenched facility for self-deprecation, she frequently used them as trivets on her dining table. Every now and again when “the girls” gathered, someone invariably asked whom they were dining on that evening—at which point Molly would retrieve a plaque and announce the donor with a flourish as she gathered the requisite number of “trivets.” It might be from an ACLU chapter, the Sierra Club, the Colorado Bar Association, or the Texas Democracy Foundation. Such utilitarian use of awards was not done out of any disrespect to the presenters; it was more a practical matter. The way she looked at it, these awards were of more value protecting her handcrafted dinner table than they were hanging on her walls.

We traded war stories, like the time I scooped the police beat reporter by covering a triple homicide—earning me my first above-the-fold A1 news story. It was a keeper in the best old-school style: three dead and one infant who was subsequently determined to be alive when a cop gingerly reached out to cover the blood-spattered baby and it let out a squall that startled the tough guy so completely that he shrieked, prompting others to shriek and prompting the infant to cry even louder. Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure I told that story over dinner, but not meat loaf—and for sure not meatballs and spaghetti.

Although her dearest newspaper love was the pugnacious
Texas Observer
, Molly also did early time at the
Houston Chronicle
, serious time at the
Minneapolis Star-Tribune
, and hard time at the
New York Times
. In Minneapolis her tenure was distinguished by one assignment in particular. It is one of those stories Molly told on herself, so here goes:

At some point in her three-year tenure as the
Star-Tribune
's first-ever female police reporter, Molly was dispatched to cover a homicide on a very cold starting-to-snow-again Minnesota day. When she arrived, totally inappropriately dressed for the occasion—after all, this was her first full-time, post-Columbia gig and she wanted to make a good impression—she promptly discerned that to interview the cops on the scene she would have to get to the bottom of a shallow but nonetheless treacherous ravine, where the recently departed lay.

Wearing a smart pair of heels, a sturdy down-to-the-knees winter coat, a black cashmere sweater, a straight black wool skirt, gloves, and pearls, Molly was perfectly attired to cover a homicide in New York's Central Park, but not one in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. In the winter.

As she gingerly descended, step by cautious step, her heel snagged on a rock or a root and gravity took over, landing her in a belly flop on the body—and further contaminating a crime scene already compromised by inclement weather. The stunned silence created by her abrupt arrival was punctuated by a police lieutenant who reportedly snarled, “Who the fuck is that?”

In the ensuing years she otherwise comported herself professionally, covering city and county stories. But Minnesota was not a much better fit than New York City would come to be. For one thing, it was very, very, very cold. She liked to say that other than the dead guy in the ravine, her only big Minneapolis crime story featured a Norwegian consul accused of shoplifting a package of wild rice. When she left Minnesota for warmer climes she was appropriately honored: the Minneapolis Police Department named its pig mascot “Molly.” Ever one to view life through the prism of humor generously laced with irony, she was flattered.

When Molly returned to Texas, she and Kaye Northcott became coeditors of the
Observer
, still one of the nation's gutsiest independent publications. It was the perfect place for those who didn't care about money, because the
Observer
didn't have any. The gamin-like Northcott has a soft-spoken demeanor that conceals a rapier wit and a wicked sense of humor. Kaye and Molly shared many meals together, primarily because Molly loved to cook and Kaye didn't quite so much. It was an epicurean yin/yang configuration that worked well for both. As coeditors they covered the state legislature—Molly the House, Kaye the Senate.

For all her journalistic feistiness, when you Google “bleeding heart,” Molly's photograph should pop up.

Case in point and a true story:

Kaye had a dog classified (by her) as a “Texas Blackhound,” a Weimaraner–black Lab mix unlikely to be listed in anybody's AKC registry. She had managed to give away all of the puppies from a litter sired by her dog, J. Edgar.

Magnolia Blossom went to Kaye's sister. Sport found a home with Dave Richards and his then-wife, Ann. (Sport once ate a marijuana cigarette and proceeded to dig a big hole and circle it many, many, many times before plopping into it and falling into a sound, weed-induced doggy sleep.) One puppy remained.

So, the night before Kaye was to leave on a much-needed vacation, Molly dropped by to say bon voyage. In the course of friendly farewell chatter, Molly asked about the remaining puppy, the one that had somehow acquired a blob of poop on its forehead shortly after its birth.

Knowing exactly how her vulnerable guest would react, Kaye casually shared a bit of information with “entrapment” written all over it: since she, Kaye, was about to go out of town for the weekend, she would just take this darling little puppy to the pound. If they found a home for him, wonderful, but if not, well, with any luck
maybe
he'd be there when she returned.

Molly, convinced that the pup would probably
not
be there, offered to play foster mom for the weekend. Thirteen years later she still had the dog, which she'd named Shit. Kaye says the moniker was not appreciated.

“I think that poor dog knew its name was just wrong. I mean, nobody says ‘shit' in a nice way. Molly realized that word of the dog's name was bound to reach her editors, and the
New York Times
would have a hard time understanding how they'd managed to hire someone who named her pet after fecal matter. The dog's neuroses probably escalated when she moved to New York and, for some reason, changed its name to ‘Sitter.'”

Although Kaye can't remember a single instance in which she cooked for Molly, she does remember food-related events. One in particular occurred during the “Ides of March” weekend on Bob Armstrong's ranch some forty-five miles northwest of Austin.

Armstrong, a member of the Texas Legislature from 1963 to 1970, went on to become land commissioner, a member of the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission and, ultimately, assistant secretary of the interior under President Bill Clinton. He and his then-wife, Shannon, started the campouts more than forty years ago, as a means of sharing their spread with those who might never spend time on a working ranch, let alone own one.

Four hundred acres of the 628-acre spread have been placed in conservation, which means they can never be developed. “You can run cattle, and you can have a campout, but you can't build anything on them,” Armstrong said with a chuckle. “It's also nice because it's really hard to find.”

Armstrong met Molly when he was still in the Lege, and remembers her being a regular at Dave McNeely's camp, probably because Dave attended the first-ever Armstrong campout, in 1971, and has missed only one or two in the forty years since the event's inception. Dave and Armstrong had known each other since Armstrong's 1970 run for land commissioner. Dave was his press secretary, travel aide, and all-round Guy Friday.

“Bob celebrated his victory the following February, as I recall, for his supporters from around the state and members of the Texas capitol press not averse to sleeping on the ground and using the great outdoors for their toilet needs,” McNeely said.

“During the time Bob and his next wife, Linda Aaker, were in Washington in the mid-1990s, and when he was deputy secretary of the interior under President Bill Clinton, Bob, a couple of other friends, and I were responsible for getting out the word and manning the ranch until the Armstrongs could fly in for the campout.

The Armstrong Weekend Campout, as the event came to be called, comprised about ten camps scattered across the ranch site. One was the reporters' camp, somewhere else the political progressives staked their space, and so on—environmentalists, trial lawyers, fiddlers and other musicians—unabashed liberals of every stripe. Northcott's ticket to this celebratory outing was Sara Speights, who had once worked for Armstrong and later became a close friend.

It was, by all accounts, a great family weekend. Almost everyone brought tweezers because somebody's kid was always falling into cactus, necessitating removal of needles from a butt, back, thigh, or foot. Atop a cedar flagpole the camp flew a giant Texas flag because the March camp date almost always coincided with Texas Independence Day.

“We'd get all patriotic, sometimes much to the distress of Yankees who weren't accustomed to people shooting off guns in the middle of the desert,” Kaye deadpanned. “They damn near jumped out of their skin. Don Kennard—he was a state senator then—always roasted a pig, and watching folks who were waiting for the pig to be done was like viewing a scene from
Lord of the Flies
, with people circling, skulking, wanting to be the first to have at that pig.
Ours, where Molly was, was a kind of gourmet camp. We'd have steaks and fancy stews, and somehow an unofficial competition evolved where people would try to out-cook one another.

“Sometimes it would be so damn cold you really didn't want to be outside, but there we were, slogging around from one camp to another, trying to see who had the best food or the most beer or both. Molly's specialty during this particular period was beer. But she had spent a year studying in France, y'know, and had taken some cooking classes, so she made this beef thing with red wine—it had a name, beef burgundy, or something like that. We called it beef stew, but she let us know it was really
boeuf bourguignon
. She did another thing she called
pot-au-feu
. We called it chicken stew. But hey, both had wine, so how bad could they be?”

Molly was also on hand for the annual Patterson Lake frog gigging outing, organized by Randy Parten, another soldier in the lefty brigade—son of J. R. Parten and arguably the only liberal oilman Texas ever had. “We'd go out with pointy sticks and gig frogs,” Northcott explained with editorial detachment—like an artisan describing a recently mastered quilting stitch. “The idea was to nail 'em with this pointy stick, whap 'em on the side of the boat to kill 'em, then bring 'em back to the camp where somebody would clean 'em, dress 'em, and fry 'em up.”

Kaye actively participated only once. After that she just ate what others gigged.

24

TEXAS STATE REPRESENTATIVE ELLIOTT NAISHTAT
was one of those who knew Molly more as Savvy Ally Molly, friend and cook. His journey to the Texas legislature is one of those curious tales that helps clarify the confluence of Elliott, Molly, and food.

Known as a relentless champion of progressive causes, he has served more than twenty years in the Texas Legislature. Not bad for a Democrat who defeated Bob Richardson, the only Republican who had the nerve to oppose him; he's run against Libertarians since then and won handily. Not bad for a guy who never intended to be in Texas for a year—let alone four decades. And certainly not bad for a native New Yorker who wears Save the Children ties and has extraordinary radar for free meals.

The sixty-seven-year-old bachelor represents the 49th District, an elongated sliver of legislative real estate that runs through central Austin. It includes low-income, multiethnic, and inner-city neighborhoods, a few pockets of affluence, and the University of Texas.

And if you're wondering how a self-described pacifist Jew from Brooklyn ended up in the state legislature, it's okay; there are still times when he wonders the same thing. For one thing, it was the '60s when his tale began—1966, to be exact.