Around 1997, I was working backstage at the Bates Recital Hall, a place built for the 24-ton pipe organ it houses and little else. The backstage was little more than a cramped galley that allowed musicians access to the stage, enclosed by heavy wooden doors on oily hinges. Working back there meant sidling past broken stands and timpani in storage. I wore my "dress" blacks for the event, some women's leadership thingy. Black suit pants, black shirt, black vest, matte black shoes, black fanny pack with all the essentials. I could walk onstage if I had to, and I could pass unseen when needed. I liked the anonymity.
About 10 minutes before Go, I turned around and saw a blonde bouffant staring me in the face. A good foot beneath it was my former Governor and soon-to-be Keynoter, Ann Richards. "Hello," I stumbled. "Hello Governor." She was tiny. Astonishing. In her heels and hair, she was almost my height. Take those off and she'd lose a foot and a half. I marveled that such fortitude came in such a tiny person. I was staring. "Hello young man," Governor Ann said, in her steel magnolia voice. We exchanged backstage niceties of water and cough drops. "I'd vote for you again if I could," I remember saying. She smiled then, but didn't reply.
Her friend Liz Carpenter introduced the Governor. The audience stood and cheered. I opened the heavy backstage door, and the last Yellow Rose of Texas bloomed in all her glory.