A runner’s final lap
After I became the Stamford Advocate’s city editor two decades years ago, I went to lunch with then-Mayor Dan Malloy. He tried to gauge my sense of his hometown. I tried to measure the thickness of his skin.
Malloy was a popular guy in Stamford at century’s end, but he was already baiting critics.
As we considered our downtown dining options, I made a suggestion by thumbing across Columbus Park to Curley’s Diner, which resembles a giant toppled Diet Coke can. A sign in the Quonset hut’s window declared Malloy “The Grinch who stole Curley’s Diner,” a critique of his administration’s efforts to claim the 1940s property by eminent domain.
Malloy took a pass on my choice but didn’t flinch. Thick skin, check.
During editorial boards over the intervening decades, I’ve seen Malloy crack wise himself on most occasions, and show humility during a state probe that cleared him of accusations but resulted in the only defeat of his political career in the 2006 gubernatorial primary.
That loss may also have ensured him a perfect November record as incumbent Republican Jodi Rell won re-election with 63 percent of the vote. In 2009, I was in Malloy’s office when he casually diagrammed how political pieces would fall into place to clear his path to become governor (e.g., “Blumenthal won’t run”). Everything he predicted came true
We met for a final editorial board in the governor’s office in Hartford a few days before Christmas, a few weeks before Malloy plans to end his political career at 63. It reaches back longer than most people realize.
“I lost a student government race at Boston College in the spring of ’75,” he recalls of his alma mater, which will welcome him back as a teacher after he leaves office Jan. 9. “But pretty much I have continuously held public office since fourth grade.”
His setbacks are well-documented (Curley’s Diner stands triumphant), but Malloy’s most remarkable political feat may be in forecasting a Democrat’s ability to succeed him. It should have been a gimme for Republicans to replace one of the most unpopular governors. Instead, Ned Lamont is the first Democrat successor for an open governor’s seat in Connecticut since 1877.
I haven’t seen this version of Malloy in a while. He’s so relaxed that he tilts his lean frame into a wall and swings his foot like the pendulum of a grandfather’s clock to demonstrate a successful remedy for nagging plantar fasciitis that suspended his daily running routine.
I’ve documented his tics in the past, like when his voice gets pitchy as he goes on the defensive. He seems to have packed them along with “so much crap” from his office.
He briefly impersonates comedian Jon Lovitz doing his “that’s the ticket” routine. As he talks, he places his hands on the arms of his chair and rocks it on the back legs like he’s vacationing on a waterfront porch at sunset.
We toss out a question we asked every primary candidate in August, about how he would spend a perfect day off. Malloy offers details that are unexpected (“I took up koi goldfish ponding as a hobby”), and a final one that is downright romantic.
“My wife is my best friend. We met on April 6, 1974. We’ve been married since Sept. 25, 1982, and on a perfect day that I’m not working I’m doing something with my wife and on a perfect day when I’m working I start with my wife and end with my wife.”
He becomes more engaged by another fantasy question, a request to take us on a virtual tour of Connecticut, sans the VR goggles. He sprinkles a lot of nutmeg, riding buses from New Britain to Hartford, touring campuses, growing industries and arts institutions he promoted. He pauses to honor the victims of the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting.
Malloy doesn’t conceal that welcoming a parade of journalists in his final days is an attempt to bang dents out of his halo.
Mostly, though, he defaults to his personal journey. Malloy’s entire body clenches like a fist clutching a memory as he recounts a fourth-grade report that “I was mentally retarded and my mother’s expectations were too great.”
He is the product of a mother’s resolve
“You’ve known me for a long time. This race and religion and nationality stuff is all very important to me. It’s foundational in who I am. I got picked on as a kid because of my learning differences. That’s bad enough. But getting picked on because of the color of your skin or because you’re poor ... I could work through some of my issues as a kid, and I did, but you can’t change the color of your skin. You can’t change the wealth of your parents. You shouldn’t change your religion unless you want to. Or your nationality. Somebody has to stand up for people.”
It reads like a timeless stump speech, but he delivers those final seven words not in a rising flourish, but in a hush.
Dan Malloy has always stood up for people. In time, more people should stand up for him.
It should have been a gimme for Republicans to replace one of the most unpopular governors. Instead, Ned Lamont is the first Democrat successor for an open governor’s seat in Connecticut since 1877.