Simple Living with Wanda Urbanska

Wanda's Diary Entries

Tuesday, October 11, 2005

John de Graaf is one of the many people who started us on the path toward television production around the idea of simple living. Years ago—1993 to be exact—John’s wife Paula handed him the paperback copy of our 1992 book, Simple Living: One Couple’s Search for a Better Life, which she had received as a press copy from Penguin at her public radio station in Seattle. He read the book and gave us a call and soon we were fast friends. For many years, John has been a public television producer, and, at the time he called, he was working a documentary about time pressure in American life. It became a national PBS primetime special called, “Running Out of Time.” So he brought his camera crew from Seattle to Mount Airy to shoot the orchard, us and Frank’s father, who was in his last year of life. (In fact, Sam Levering died between the time John shot the footage and the program was broadcast, and John dedicated the show to Sam’s memory.)

John later invited me to host his 1998 PBS primetime special, “Escape from Affluenza.” This show—which along with its prequel, “Affluenza,”—was a major hit on PBS and led us down the path toward a series.

At the recent Green Festival in Washington DC, we had the good fortune to run into John. We made a date to have dinner with him. Frank, Henry and I had all dined with John through the years, but for Bob Wells, it was a first-time experience. We shared a cab from the Washington Convention Center to Dupont Circle where John steered us to Afterwords Cafe, the restaurant attached to Kramer Books. We ate outdoors and compared notes about our projects and careers. Frank had recently seen Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee on CSPAN talking about attacking the “obesity epidemic” in his state. Frank was moved by Huckabee’s personal story of weight loss and reframing his thinking around food. Frank passed onto John the anecdote that amuses him and makes us laugh every time we hear it. Mike had related how in a high school class all students were asked to bring in symbols of their particular religion. A Jewish girl brought in a Menorah; a Catholic girl brought in rosary beads; and he, Mike, a Southern Baptist, brought in a “covered dish casserole.” “All we did in church was eat,” said Mike. It was great catching up with John, comparing notes. Old friendships—even ones with ups and downs—are always worth keeping.