Jill Biden Learned 'Healing Role' from Others' Kindness When She Faced Tragedy: 'What a Difference It Makes'
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The first lady has racked up many miles traveling to many places across the country to comfort people experiencing darkness in their lives
Dr. Jill Biden has visited 35 states since entering the White House with her husband, President Joe Biden, who's comparatively been to 24 since taking office. And all during a pandemic.
Whether it's to meet families who've lost everything in recent Colorado fires, whose communities were destroyed by tornadoes in Kentucky, to offer hope after a condo building collapsed in Miami or to console survivors and mourners after a deadly Waukesha Christmas parade incident in Wisconsin, many of the first lady's trips have been to console Americans going through tragedy.
Dr. Biden, 70, says she didn't expect to take on a "healing role" but tells the Associated Press in a new interview, "We've faced so much as a nation."
Leon Neal/Getty Images First Lady Dr. Jill Biden
The urge to get out of Washington, D.C., comes from what she says she would expect from a leader in her position.
"I would want to know that my president and first lady cared about me," the first lady told the AP. "I think that's an important part of what I do. I mean, just helping people through the tough times."
The Bidens have been through well-known trials of their own, including the death of the president's son Beau to brain cancer at 46 and losing several of the first lady's friends to breast cancer.
"I know the tough things that we've been through in our life and I know … how much the acts of kindness have meant to me and to Joe," Dr. Biden told the AP. "So I just know what a difference it makes when you show up. I think showing up is really important."
Michael Reynolds/EPA/Bloomberg via Getty
Back in D.C., the first lady said she is still in awe of her home of a year now, the White House, which she calls a "magical place."
"'Wow, look where I am,' " she said she tells herself each morning, waking up in the residence. But she refuses to "get my coffee and sit in bed and watch the news."
"I've always said that if I were ever given this platform I would never waste it. Not one day," she said. "That's why when I wake every day I think, 'What can I do today? ... What am I doing? Where am I going? What's the strategy? What's the plan?'"
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So often in her first year as first lady, that has meant receiving a travel itinerary and taking off for one state or another.
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Jill Biden
For her second year, though, Dr. Biden said she's looking to "layer some things on" to her already busy schedule — including spending more time socializing, a traditional first lady's role, and welcoming artists and visitors to the White House, as long as the pandemic allows it.
"It's going to be an exciting year. It's got to be a better year with the pandemic," she said. "Everybody across this country is saying, 'C'mon, it's got to be a better year.' "
