[Congressional Record Volume 159, Number 43 (Friday, March 22, 2013)]
[Senate]
[Pages S2322-S2323]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      REMEMBERING CASSANDRA WOODS

  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, earlier this month, I, my staff, and the 
entire State of Michigan lost someone very special. Cassandra Woods, my 
longtime State staff director, passed away after fighting cancer for 
two decades.
  Cassandra Woods was one of the most extraordinary people I have ever 
known.
  She became the heart and soul of my Michigan offices. After beginning 
as an intern more than 30 years ago, she served as my State director 
for the last 12. She led a staff of 25 in 7 offices around the State 
into becoming a cohesive team serving the public.
  In countless efforts to bring growth and hope to our people, she 
pressed forward and never wavered--from riverfront projects, to M-1 
Rail on Woodward Avenue, to Focus:HOPE, to our effort to bring a 
baseball academy for kids adjacent to the old Tiger Stadium field, and 
oh so much more in so many places around our state.
  She was an invaluable source of advice and counsel to me and to my 
Washington staff. She represented me at public events and in meetings 
with State and local officials. All the while, she kept adding her 
energy and her way of looking at life to her own personal missions.
  Cassandra brought to her family and to our community her unique 
combination of great inner strength and an outward gentleness, an iron 
will with a smiling demeanor, a way of being direct and blunt in an 
engaging and positive way, imparting tough love and discipline with 
compassion and almost always with that wonderful laugh of hers.
  Cassandra's legendary courage in her two-decade battle with cancer 
and the way she inspired others to take on that adversity with fierce 
calm left an indelible impact on the countless people whom she lifted 
up.
  I am fortunate enough in my job to meet some incredibly brave people. 
I have traveled many times to Afghanistan and other places where 
American troops are in harm's way. I have met young men and women who 
have done incredible things, shown unfathomable courage, faced dangers 
so great that, had they simply turned and fled in terror, none of us 
could really blame them. And I have heard and remembered the stories of 
those who chose not to flee, knowing that by standing their ground, 
they would risk or even give up their lives.
  Cassandra Woods' life was worthy of a different kind of awe. John F. 
Kennedy once wrote, ``Without belittling the courage with which men 
have died, we should not forget those acts of courage with which men 
have lived.'' Cassandra had an unflinching courage to live and to pass 
that courage on to others. She became a tireless and effective advocate 
for cancer patients. After defeating cancer for the first time almost 
20 years ago, she felt a responsibility, with God's help, to assist 
others, in her words, to ``come through the fire and come out whole.''
  Her life-affirming commitment was present when she was on the 
frontlines a few years ago in the electoral battle to permit stem cell 
research in Michigan and, of course, in her joyous activities in her 
church.
  When Barb and I visited with Cassandra a few days before she passed 
away, she reminisced about many things. More than anything else, she 
spoke to us about her love of her family, her mother and her children. 
With special passion, she spoke of her two grandchildren: Justin, with 
whom she spent so much time and whom she took so much joy in watching 
grow; and Bianca, who slept in Cassandra's bed after the two of them 
would sing songs together to help Bianca fall asleep.
  Cassandra applied a sense of family to our community. One Christmas, 
the staff, who loved her so much and whom she loved so much, was 
discussing how long to close our offices over the holidays. Some wanted 
our offices closed for the whole week between Christmas and New Year's. 
Cassandra wouldn't hear of such a thing. Christmas is a time of year 
when some of Senator Levin's constituents need our help the most, she 
said. We shouldn't close the office more than a day or two. And that 
was the end of the discussion. It was so typical of Cassandra; she was 
always thinking of others who might need help.
  The poet Dylan Thomas urged us not to go ``gentle into that good 
night'' but rather to ``rage against the dying of the light.'' 
Cassandra Woods chose another way to leave us--by going gently, guided 
by her brave heart and her abiding faith and with the same grace and 
confidence that marked her life, a life so full of a light that will 
not die but will shine always in the hearts of all of us who loved her.

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