All Things At Once

Mika Brzezinski has written an honest and warm, easy to read memoir of her climb to fame. One almost feels that they have become a personal friend, as they gather up the pages of her life. Although still quite young, she has had so many diverse experiences in her childhood and career that there is plenty to include in her story. Raised by a stern father and an artistic and creative, possibly eccentric, mother she was nevertheless always in an atmosphere filled with love and acceptance. She was encouraged to be the best she could be and she always aspired to that goal but added an additional codicil. She wanted to be the be-all to everyone, an impossible combination since some sacrifices always have to be made in one area or another in order to achieve success. Humans don’t have the time or the capacity to do it all well. Something will suffer in the effort and, many times, she explains how something certainly did, often reducing her to tears. Frolicking in the White House as a youngster with the likes of Amy Carter certainly would not be considered a mainstream childhood but Mika seems to have taken it all in stride. Her mom encouraged her to be herself and often, “herself”, brought considerable embarrassment to the family, in public situations. She was always appreciated for whom she was, though, and was expected to achieve while remaining true to herself. In her teens, she discovers a love for journalism and begins early, to pursue it. In her twenties, finding the love of her life, a soul mate, also pursuing the same career, she marries Jimmy Hoffer and begins to raise a family. Her life seems like “everymans”. Living on a shoestring they move from one small apartment to another fixer-upper of a home, from locale to locale, making the adjustments necessary to further their careers and maintain some kind of home life. Equally supporting of each other, the marriage survives. For Mika, however, the pressure rises to a boiling point since being perfect in all ways, seems to be her compulsive aim. Until the time when a tragedy occurs, as she tumbles down the stairs with her infant, she does not really fully understand how her inability to place things in the proper perspective is hurting her. She is driven by ambition. She is driven by a need to be the perfect everything, wife, mother, journalist, et al. Although she claims that she has gotten ahead, in some respects, a leg up, because of who she is, though she has never curried those favors, one can’t help but notice that she kept her name, Brzezinksi, one that does not get lost in the shuffle of obscurity, rather than assuming her husband’s name, Hoffer. However, Mika, is very much interested in women’s issues and perhaps, in fairness to her, I might give her the benefit of the doubt and assume it was for that reason that she kept her own name, not for personal advantage. She certainly climbed up to the top, from the basement, and took the worst jobs at the worst times of day or night for reporting, so one does have to give her enormous credit. The need for hard work and effort have never stopped her, in fact, they seem to encourage her in her pursuit of her dream. Her descriptions of life, in the newsroom and television world, are right on. It exposes the cutthroat atmosphere that is its reputation, as real. Friends will “eat” friends in order to get ahead. She will not sign on to that behavior but does admit that, at times, she may have spoken once too often in order to impress someone, only to fall to earth rather quickly as a result. Today, she is a rising star or perhaps her star has already risen. She works side by side with Joe Scarborough on MSNBC’s Morning Joe and is charming, witty and warm, exactly how she presents in her memoir. If I had to describe the book with adjectives I would say it is friendly, open and honest. You will feel as if you are her personal confidant as you read it and when you close the book you will think you know her. She has embraced you with her words and you will embrace her. She is tough, driven, emotional