Brothers and sisters, near and far

As a dedicated unionist, my AFT brothers and sisters outside of the GTFF are never far from my thoughts, but they're more present today:

• My condolences to the family, friends, and colleagues of AFT-Ohio President Tom Mooney. I'll remember Tom as an energetic advocate of graduate employee rights in Ohio and as a genuinely nice guy who took an interest in developing young labor leaders. Tom also gave me some new parent advice when the wee wobs was still pretty fresh out of the womb: Start taking your kid out to restaurants early, and take them hungry. If you feed them beforehand in hopes of them not freaking out because of their hunger, they won't want to eat and will in turn destroy everything within arm's reach. Turns out to be good advice 95% of the time.
• I just had a pleasant conversation with fellow organizer RH in Madison about steward structures, the kind of nuts-and-bolts conversations that I've come to enjoy over the last five years. One day, I hope all of these conversations with each other pay off and we can all build the Perfect Organization, then pass it on to uninterested hacks who will proceed to destroy all our hard work, thus ensuring our immortality as tragic figures in the mold of Sisyphus.