I believe service to others can heal a
broken heart in 2006 I had a pretty
close to perfect life I had three
healthy children I lived in a great
house
it was warm great dinners lots of family
and friends there were some robust
arguments a couple of dirty dogs but it
was a great place to live and a
beautiful wonderful husband I started
dating my husband in my 20s we couldn’t
have been more different he was raised
in a privileged home outside of DC the
son of a wealthy Jewish developer I on
the other hand was every Jewish mother’s
nightmare
I was a single mom I was Catholic and I
happened to work for their company
needless to say we put all our
differences aside we fell in love when
we got married and it was bliss it was a
great life on December 14 2006 I
received one of three phone calls that
would alter my life would change my life
forever and it started by our attorney
calling he said Michelle we think
there’s been an accident my husband Josh
Freeman often took a helicopter from our
home in wash outside of Washington DC to
our projects in southern Delaware or to
Virginia or to Maryland and on this
particular night the weather was bad I
actually knew right when I got the first
phone call that he was gone but the
second phone call was from the State
Police and they said Miss Freeman are
you with family there’s been a
helicopter accident and there are no
survivors at that moment
what that moment is like there are no
words to describe
they wouldn’t do that moment justice
because everything you knew on December
14th before that second is completely
different after everything has changed
all the routines all the sounds all the
smells the way your house looked and
felt it’s all different now I had a
belief that everything in your life led
to the next thing that was a core
spiritual belief of mine and I had faced
adversity I had faced addiction at 20 I
had been a single parent I had faced my
own kind of poverty and been on food
stamps but this was next level
this pain was something I had never felt
before
I knew deep inside of myself that it
would challenge everything I believed
about who Michelle Freeman was and it
would challenge everything I thought
about my relationship to God those first
few weeks days and months and even the
first couple of years
there are full-time periods that are
just gone from my memory for months but
what I do remember very clearly is that
every morning I would wake up and I come
would have to reteach myself that this
was my new reality and I would face this
question Who am I going to be today
am I going to be a victim or am I going
to be a captain a victim or a captain
and some mornings I would get in my
shower and the only thing I could do
would be to crawl to kind of get dressed
to be able to care for my children with
the help of family and friends
I had a two-year-old a four-year-old and
a fifteen year old that were relying on
me I had to be there for them those
first few months
and even into that first year the pain
is deep in your gut it’s a it’s a sorrow
that I have never felt before it comes
up much like the feel the feeling you
get when you’re going to be sick it’s a
force that way and there were many times
when it would come up and come out like
a scream and one of the things I was
certain of is that if I didn’t put that
energy that force into something it
would consume me in the very darkest
times after Josh died I heard one
person’s voice very clearly my
mother-in-law Virginia Freeman
she was really fond of saying all things
work toward good she didn’t mean just
the good things work toward good she
meant all things work toward good
including the really hard things which
started a question in my mind what if I
could take what has happened to me and
turn it around what if I could take the
energy and sadness and make something
happen for someone else now my husband
Josh Freeman he loved the Arts he was
raised in the Kennedy Center my
father-in-law served on the board
he loved any kind of live music he could
find he was the first one to buy a
ticket and the first one to invite you
to come with him and this was a part of
our life you’d walk into our home and
you’d hear Pavarotti or Springsteen and
so I knew that something something I
could create would be around the arts in
southern Delaware which is located you
know
west of or East I’m sorry east of
Washington DC and just south of
Philadelphia there were no theatres if
you were growing up there you were
basically driving two or three hours
to get to a symphony see a play and so
not only were the adults not having that
cultural experience of the arts but
neither were the children and so I
thought to myself what if I could start
something where a family just like mine
could have an experience together could
share a native theatre
what if kids would be able to hear the
symphony or see a play and not have to
get on a bus and travel up ninety five
and so out of those thoughts the first
version of the Joshua F Riemann
Foundation and the Freeman stage was
born and in those beginning days I did
everything
we all did everything I made coffee
I put away chairs and there was some
semblance of the physical part of it and
the actual mental part of it that worked
thinking about it it it started to heal
me the philanthropic work of the Freeman
stage started to heal my heart and it
was everything that the dark place
wasn’t the dark place was lonely it was
isolating the Freeman stage was love and
inclusion it was light and so we went
about about presenting the arts and we
did this thing where we would bring kids
and from all the schools around and now
children were getting to see and
experience the arts and that that mended
the heart even further it occurred to me
that this wasn’t the first time I had
seen this and work in my life when you
walk into a trial strip program to to
clean up your life from addiction you’ll
meet an old-timer and you’re the new
timer and they’ll look at you and say
you’re going to show up on Tuesday night
and you’re gonna put put away chairs or
put down chairs and you’re gonna make
coffee and you’re gonna serve others and
you’re indignant
as a newcomer you’re beaten the diseases
ravaged you and you think to yourself
what why would I serve others and then
and the old-timer says you’ll do it and
you’ll understand why now thirty years
later in my own sobriety I look back and
I understand the grace in making a pot
of coffee I understand that that
newcomer when making the pot of coffee
feels care is responsible is something
larger involved in something larger than
themselves they start to care about life
again so two years ago I got the great
fortune of seeing Hamilton lin-manuel
Miranda’s masterpiece and it’s the end
of the play and the entire cast is on
the stage and they start singing a song
called
who lives who dies who tells our story
and I start crying and my teenagers were
mortified but this song wasn’t about
Alexander Hamilton it was about Eliza
Hamilton and Eliza Hamilton when faced
with her son’s death her husband’s death
the song says what did you do and she
said she says I put myself back in the
narrative I put myself back in the
narrative she went on to start the first
orphanage private orphanage in New York
City which still stands today
and then she raised funds for the
Washington Monument and then she fights
racism which is unheard of in her time
she turns her pain into power and
purpose for the good of others in 2014
when I thought I absolutely could not
find love again in my life it’s eight
years after my husband has died and this
beautiful man comes in my life he’s an
award-winning chef his name is Matt
Haley we’ve been friends
years and we fall madly in love and he
has on his bucket list that he’s going
to drive through India and on him on the
back of a motorcycle and I speak to to
Matt at 12 a.m. I love you Matt I see a
future with you Matt and at 6 a.m. I
received the third worst phone call in
my life
Michelle there’s been an accident and in
a few days later Matt died once again
service was the thing I I turn to
because I can tell you at that point all
I really wanted to do was die I had
nothing left I called out to God and
said what’s my purpose why am I here and
why does this keep happening to me what
I did know is that only two weeks after
Matt died I had made a promise to raise
money in an impoverished tough
neighborhood in Washington DC Ward seven
and eight a place called the ark which
is full of hope and I showed up my heart
wasn’t there my brain wasn’t there but
my body was and I showed up and I got
back to the service that had saved me
once before I went back to the Freeman
stage and I did the things that mattered
the first time around I made coffee I
picked up chairs it occurs to me that as
human beings if we can take the very
time that were the most needy that we
feel like we need to be taken care of
and become givers if we can look at our
sorrow and pain and turn that into
purpose its transforming it’s magic
call and it frees you you can even find
in that space the ability to become
grateful for the very thing that has
caused you the pain just recently I was
in New York City and I visited the
memorial the 9/11 memorial and my guide
Fred who was fantastic asked for him if
you ever go to the 9/11 memorial pointed
out a person’s name on on the memorial
steven gerrard Siller
he was a New York City fireman who was
in one of the boroughs when the first
plane hit the first tower he went home
he had just served a 12-hour shift he
went home he got 75 pounds of gear on
his back and tried to make it back into
a Manhattan where all his brothers and
firefighters were the Battery Tunnel was
closed and so he ran he ran through the
Battery Tunnel with 75 pounds of gear on
his back and he died in the second tower
now anybody under under those
unspeakable tragedy on that unspeakable
tragedy that family had every right to
do absolutely nothing but they didn’t
they started a foundation in his name
which runs that same race every year
through the Battery Tunnel and runs
races in 50 cities and three countries
around the world they’ve granted over 25
million dollars to our veterans who need
accommodations in their houses they’ve
taken care of hurricane victims and they
pay for first responders children this
is extraordinary right I mean this this
rule that I’m talking about about
turning pain into something good this
isn’t just about death because when I
think about the greatest leaders I know
politically
philanthropically in business it’s the
people that have taken the hard
adversity in their life the stuff that’s
really challenged them whether it’s been
bigotry bullying rape homophobia and
they’ve used those very things to fight
against to become advocates for change
on so today so today I go out to the
Freeman stage fifty three times a summer
and today the Freeman stage is still an
outpouring of how my sorrow turned into
joy for others it has served three
hundred and eighty thousand people and a
hundred thousand schoolchildren have
seen some kind of art program here it
has a vibrant group of people that
everyday get to bring joy to others and
there’s volunteers over a hundred of
them that show up every night to help us
do this maybe they’re working through
their own pain maybe they just believe
in giving you’ll find me still there at
the Freeman stage putting away chairs
most evenings it’s true I am not perfect
I don’t wake up happy every day I don’t
I still struggle but I do see the beauty
of my journey I do know that through
service we can take something sorrowful
and we can make good in the world I do
know and believe that each of us has the
power to do that within ourselves
so I’m gonna keep showing up I know the
secret that to heal a broken heart you
have to serve others thank you very much
[Applause]
broken heart in 2006 I had a pretty
close to perfect life I had three
healthy children I lived in a great
house
it was warm great dinners lots of family
and friends there were some robust
arguments a couple of dirty dogs but it
was a great place to live and a
beautiful wonderful husband I started
dating my husband in my 20s we couldn’t
have been more different he was raised
in a privileged home outside of DC the
son of a wealthy Jewish developer I on
the other hand was every Jewish mother’s
nightmare
I was a single mom I was Catholic and I
happened to work for their company
needless to say we put all our
differences aside we fell in love when
we got married and it was bliss it was a
great life on December 14 2006 I
received one of three phone calls that
would alter my life would change my life
forever and it started by our attorney
calling he said Michelle we think
there’s been an accident my husband Josh
Freeman often took a helicopter from our
home in wash outside of Washington DC to
our projects in southern Delaware or to
Virginia or to Maryland and on this
particular night the weather was bad I
actually knew right when I got the first
phone call that he was gone but the
second phone call was from the State
Police and they said Miss Freeman are
you with family there’s been a
helicopter accident and there are no
survivors at that moment
what that moment is like there are no
words to describe
they wouldn’t do that moment justice
because everything you knew on December
14th before that second is completely
different after everything has changed
all the routines all the sounds all the
smells the way your house looked and
felt it’s all different now I had a
belief that everything in your life led
to the next thing that was a core
spiritual belief of mine and I had faced
adversity I had faced addiction at 20 I
had been a single parent I had faced my
own kind of poverty and been on food
stamps but this was next level
this pain was something I had never felt
before
I knew deep inside of myself that it
would challenge everything I believed
about who Michelle Freeman was and it
would challenge everything I thought
about my relationship to God those first
few weeks days and months and even the
first couple of years
there are full-time periods that are
just gone from my memory for months but
what I do remember very clearly is that
every morning I would wake up and I come
would have to reteach myself that this
was my new reality and I would face this
question Who am I going to be today
am I going to be a victim or am I going
to be a captain a victim or a captain
and some mornings I would get in my
shower and the only thing I could do
would be to crawl to kind of get dressed
to be able to care for my children with
the help of family and friends
I had a two-year-old a four-year-old and
a fifteen year old that were relying on
me I had to be there for them those
first few months
and even into that first year the pain
is deep in your gut it’s a it’s a sorrow
that I have never felt before it comes
up much like the feel the feeling you
get when you’re going to be sick it’s a
force that way and there were many times
when it would come up and come out like
a scream and one of the things I was
certain of is that if I didn’t put that
energy that force into something it
would consume me in the very darkest
times after Josh died I heard one
person’s voice very clearly my
mother-in-law Virginia Freeman
she was really fond of saying all things
work toward good she didn’t mean just
the good things work toward good she
meant all things work toward good
including the really hard things which
started a question in my mind what if I
could take what has happened to me and
turn it around what if I could take the
energy and sadness and make something
happen for someone else now my husband
Josh Freeman he loved the Arts he was
raised in the Kennedy Center my
father-in-law served on the board
he loved any kind of live music he could
find he was the first one to buy a
ticket and the first one to invite you
to come with him and this was a part of
our life you’d walk into our home and
you’d hear Pavarotti or Springsteen and
so I knew that something something I
could create would be around the arts in
southern Delaware which is located you
know
west of or East I’m sorry east of
Washington DC and just south of
Philadelphia there were no theatres if
you were growing up there you were
basically driving two or three hours
to get to a symphony see a play and so
not only were the adults not having that
cultural experience of the arts but
neither were the children and so I
thought to myself what if I could start
something where a family just like mine
could have an experience together could
share a native theatre
what if kids would be able to hear the
symphony or see a play and not have to
get on a bus and travel up ninety five
and so out of those thoughts the first
version of the Joshua F Riemann
Foundation and the Freeman stage was
born and in those beginning days I did
everything
we all did everything I made coffee
I put away chairs and there was some
semblance of the physical part of it and
the actual mental part of it that worked
thinking about it it it started to heal
me the philanthropic work of the Freeman
stage started to heal my heart and it
was everything that the dark place
wasn’t the dark place was lonely it was
isolating the Freeman stage was love and
inclusion it was light and so we went
about about presenting the arts and we
did this thing where we would bring kids
and from all the schools around and now
children were getting to see and
experience the arts and that that mended
the heart even further it occurred to me
that this wasn’t the first time I had
seen this and work in my life when you
walk into a trial strip program to to
clean up your life from addiction you’ll
meet an old-timer and you’re the new
timer and they’ll look at you and say
you’re going to show up on Tuesday night
and you’re gonna put put away chairs or
put down chairs and you’re gonna make
coffee and you’re gonna serve others and
you’re indignant
as a newcomer you’re beaten the diseases
ravaged you and you think to yourself
what why would I serve others and then
and the old-timer says you’ll do it and
you’ll understand why now thirty years
later in my own sobriety I look back and
I understand the grace in making a pot
of coffee I understand that that
newcomer when making the pot of coffee
feels care is responsible is something
larger involved in something larger than
themselves they start to care about life
again so two years ago I got the great
fortune of seeing Hamilton lin-manuel
Miranda’s masterpiece and it’s the end
of the play and the entire cast is on
the stage and they start singing a song
called
who lives who dies who tells our story
and I start crying and my teenagers were
mortified but this song wasn’t about
Alexander Hamilton it was about Eliza
Hamilton and Eliza Hamilton when faced
with her son’s death her husband’s death
the song says what did you do and she
said she says I put myself back in the
narrative I put myself back in the
narrative she went on to start the first
orphanage private orphanage in New York
City which still stands today
and then she raised funds for the
Washington Monument and then she fights
racism which is unheard of in her time
she turns her pain into power and
purpose for the good of others in 2014
when I thought I absolutely could not
find love again in my life it’s eight
years after my husband has died and this
beautiful man comes in my life he’s an
award-winning chef his name is Matt
Haley we’ve been friends
years and we fall madly in love and he
has on his bucket list that he’s going
to drive through India and on him on the
back of a motorcycle and I speak to to
Matt at 12 a.m. I love you Matt I see a
future with you Matt and at 6 a.m. I
received the third worst phone call in
my life
Michelle there’s been an accident and in
a few days later Matt died once again
service was the thing I I turn to
because I can tell you at that point all
I really wanted to do was die I had
nothing left I called out to God and
said what’s my purpose why am I here and
why does this keep happening to me what
I did know is that only two weeks after
Matt died I had made a promise to raise
money in an impoverished tough
neighborhood in Washington DC Ward seven
and eight a place called the ark which
is full of hope and I showed up my heart
wasn’t there my brain wasn’t there but
my body was and I showed up and I got
back to the service that had saved me
once before I went back to the Freeman
stage and I did the things that mattered
the first time around I made coffee I
picked up chairs it occurs to me that as
human beings if we can take the very
time that were the most needy that we
feel like we need to be taken care of
and become givers if we can look at our
sorrow and pain and turn that into
purpose its transforming it’s magic
call and it frees you you can even find
in that space the ability to become
grateful for the very thing that has
caused you the pain just recently I was
in New York City and I visited the
memorial the 9/11 memorial and my guide
Fred who was fantastic asked for him if
you ever go to the 9/11 memorial pointed
out a person’s name on on the memorial
steven gerrard Siller
he was a New York City fireman who was
in one of the boroughs when the first
plane hit the first tower he went home
he had just served a 12-hour shift he
went home he got 75 pounds of gear on
his back and tried to make it back into
a Manhattan where all his brothers and
firefighters were the Battery Tunnel was
closed and so he ran he ran through the
Battery Tunnel with 75 pounds of gear on
his back and he died in the second tower
now anybody under under those
unspeakable tragedy on that unspeakable
tragedy that family had every right to
do absolutely nothing but they didn’t
they started a foundation in his name
which runs that same race every year
through the Battery Tunnel and runs
races in 50 cities and three countries
around the world they’ve granted over 25
million dollars to our veterans who need
accommodations in their houses they’ve
taken care of hurricane victims and they
pay for first responders children this
is extraordinary right I mean this this
rule that I’m talking about about
turning pain into something good this
isn’t just about death because when I
think about the greatest leaders I know
politically
philanthropically in business it’s the
people that have taken the hard
adversity in their life the stuff that’s
really challenged them whether it’s been
bigotry bullying rape homophobia and
they’ve used those very things to fight
against to become advocates for change
on so today so today I go out to the
Freeman stage fifty three times a summer
and today the Freeman stage is still an
outpouring of how my sorrow turned into
joy for others it has served three
hundred and eighty thousand people and a
hundred thousand schoolchildren have
seen some kind of art program here it
has a vibrant group of people that
everyday get to bring joy to others and
there’s volunteers over a hundred of
them that show up every night to help us
do this maybe they’re working through
their own pain maybe they just believe
in giving you’ll find me still there at
the Freeman stage putting away chairs
most evenings it’s true I am not perfect
I don’t wake up happy every day I don’t
I still struggle but I do see the beauty
of my journey I do know that through
service we can take something sorrowful
and we can make good in the world I do
know and believe that each of us has the
power to do that within ourselves
so I’m gonna keep showing up I know the
secret that to heal a broken heart you
have to serve others thank you very much
[Applause]
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