On Tuesday night, Yeas & Nays got a quick peak into the lives of Senate spouses, starring one special friendship between Marcelle Leahy, wife of the Democratic Senator from Vermont Patrick Leahy, and Barbara Grassley, wife of the Republican Senator from Iowa Chuck Grassley.
Barbara Grassley was being given the Courage Award by local cope-with-cancer charity Tracy’s Kids and it was all Marcelle Leahy’s doing.
“Marcelle Leahy nominated me, she’s a past winner and, actually, she has had melanoma herself,” explained Grassley, who was given the award, in part, because she was a breast cancer survivor. “So she took me out to see the program out at the Lombardi Cancer Center and I thought, ‘yes, that’s wonderful,'” Grassley continued. Tracy’s Kids uses art therapists to help kids with cancer and the children’s families as well.
Leahy, who said she’s been involved with the group for 13 years, noted how she and her husband have been personally touched by the art therapists’ work. “Washington is a surprisingly small town, as fate would have it we have seen firsthand how Tracy’s kids works,” she began. “Our six-year-old grandson has a very good friend who is being treated at one of the clinics we serve and we also saw these wonderful art therapists in action when the son of one of Patrick’s longtime employees was being treated at Lombardi.”
The Courage Award Ceremony had a red carpet theme, with attendees scurrying off to see Oscar-nominated movies after presentations were complete. The Leahys were headed to see “Hugo.” “Because we had already seen ‘The Descendants,’ and I’ve already seen ‘Iron Lady,'” Marcelle Leahy explained. (She and her husband are big movie people). While the Grassleys headed out. “My husband has a lot of work to do, we dragged him out of a finance markup,” Barbara Grassley said.
