Madeleine Albright - Hell and Other Destinations

Contents

To Life

What I love about the theater are arrivals, departures, and returns, entrances and exits, from the wings to the stage, and from the stage to the wings. Its like going from one world into another. And on stage, I love gates, fences, walls, windows, and, of course, doors. They are the borders between different worlds, cross-sections of space and time that carry information about their contours, their beginnings, and their ends. Every wall and every door tells us that there is something on the other side of it, and thus they remind us that beyond every other side there is yet another side beyond that one. Indirectly, they ask what lies beyond the final beyond and thus broach the theme of the mystery of the universe and of Being itself. At least I think they do.

VCLAV HAVEL, from Leaving, a play (2008)

Contents

S INCE ANCIENT TIMES , we humans have had much to say about Hell. Hercules twelfth labor was to subdue the multiheaded hound that guards its gates. Dante used the inferno as the starting point for one of literatures epic journeys. Mark Twain advised us to go to paradise for the climate but to the other place for more interesting company. In slang, we use the H-word to describe something that can be given or raised, or that can zoom about on wheels. It is also the name of a town in Michigan that, on occasion, actually does freeze over. More to the point, I have so often said, Theres a special place in Hell for women who dont help other women, that Starbucks put the declaration on a coffee cuphence the title of this book.

Although we are inescapably mortal, not every destination is final. We fill our days with projects big and small that are, at any moment, in various stages of completion. The fact that we pursue them on borrowed time only heightens our desire to move ahead quickly. We yearn to accomplish much that is pleasing and praiseworthy, and from the hour our primeval ancestors began painting images on cave walls, our instinct has been to leave behind a record of what we think, do, and feel.

In a 2003 memoir, Madam Secretary, I write about my middle years, especially my career as a diplomat representing the United States as UN ambassador and secretary of state. In the more recent Prague Winter, I delve into my European childhood and the tests that my parents generation confronted amid war and the Holocaust. In Hell and Other Destinations, I will look back on the experiences that have accompanied my attempt to navigate lifes third actand steal a glance forward as well.

Early in 2001, as I neared the end of my tenure at the State Department, I directed a favorite question at myself: Whats next? I was but sixty-three years old; not ready for the rocking chair. When interviewers asked how I wished to be remembered, I replied that I didnt want to be remembered. I was still here and had plenty more I intended to do. The first step, clearly, was to draw up a list of priorities, but I am the sort of person who hates to rule anything out. So, as I prepared for what I have called my post-government afterlife, I ruled everything inwith results I describe in pages to come.

There are many prescriptions for how best to spend our allotted time on Earth. Various expert authors counsel us to be assertive, to meditate, to avoid fatty foods, to not sweat the small stuff, and never to leave home without a gun. This book, though, isnt of the self-help type. Instead, it is a collection of stories based on the premise that, although we can learn constantly from one another, we also have unique characteristics and cannot be perfect models. My own motor, as you will see, is revved to a high gear; I am most always busy. That formula might work for you, but it may not. We each have to chart our own course. Be forewarned, though, that the tales I have to tell are products of memory, and therefore untamed; they leap from one subject to the next, dip back and forth in time, and veer sharply between episodes of delight and sadness. There is a reason the ancient Greeks employed two masksthose of tragedy and comedyto reflect the human drama.

Our ambitions flow naturally from our interests, in my case an abiding preoccupation with world affairs. In the years that furnish this books focus, we witnessed the horror of 9/11, the U.S. invasion of Iraq, a debilitating financial breakdown, the leadership of three very different American presidents, and the revival of antidemocratic tendencies in many countries, including the United States. Such events supply a backdrop for the narratives that follow, some of which take place beneath a global lamp while others are more intimateand a few, embarrassing.

Several years ago, at the end of a long overnight flight, I was tired and having trouble clearing British customs. Pulled out of line, I was made to wait, then instructed by a guard using a clipped imperial accent to open my suitcases and each of the smaller bags within. I care as much as anyone about security, but I was also nearly eighty years old, blessed with a benign, albeit wrinkled countenance, and late for a meeting. Under my breath, I muttered, Why me? More minutes elapsed with the guards just standing around and onlookers whispering among themselves, pointing, and imagining what I must have done to deserve such treatment. Made shameless by frustration, I finally confronted my officious tormenters by pulling rank: Do you know who I am? There, I thought, that should do it. No, came the sympathetic reply, but we have doctors here who can help you to figure that out.

J ANUARY 2001 MARKED the beginning of a new century and the conclusion of my service as Americas sixty-fourth secretary of state. I rarely admit to feeling tired, but I was by then a little overcooked. Years of rushed plane trips, not enough exercise, too many official dinners, and bowls of taco salad when flying home had taken a toll on the contours of my Central European body. I was growing the way a mature tree does: out not up. A Washington columnist, trying to be funny, compared me to an igloo.

Although I realized that I could benefit from a less rigorous schedule, I didnt want my job to end. I loved every frenetic minute, the nonstop parade of questions, the ever-shifting mix of people with whom to share ideas, and above all the conviction that what I said and did had significance beyond my own personal fence lines. An exciting position replenishes the energy it consumes. Each morning, a brain alive with plans drew me from my slumber. Gulping coffee, I placed phone calls, jotted notes, and inhaled the narcotic aroma of breaking news. To awaken to an unfolding international clash or opportunity and know that you might have a say in its outcome is addictiveand addicts, when deprived of their regular fix, search for a new buzz.

Per the U.S. Constitution, as amended, January 20 was Inauguration Day. At noon, the new president would swear to faithfully execute the duties of his office, after which members of his team would expect us to be gone. As the hour of departure approached, I found solace in knowing that I had never been more comfortable handling the demands of my job. Eight years in the State Department had given me the best education in international affairs one could conceive. I felt as if I were a graduate student whose long nights of study had prepared her to begin a career, not a grizzled actor about to take her final bow. While in office, I had developed skills as a negotiator, become more adept in dealing with the press, learned much about what the world looks like from vantage points abroad, and thought unceasingly about how to address global problems. Every morning, when I strode from the elevator and headed for my desk, dynamic colleagues were poised to join with me in doing vital work.

I wanted more. Despite my exhaustion, I wished that time would move at a more languid pace so that I might make the most of every hour and meeting. In the White House, President Clinton told foreign leaders whose terms would outlast his that he envied them. He, too, wanted to pack in as much productive activity as possible. Still, the rosy-fingered dawns kept coming, then turning all too quickly to twilight and darkness.