Keys to Independence: CEO Kris Thompson on Housing & Hope at Calvary Women’s Services

Carolyn Spector: Madam Staker! Madam Secretary! Madam Vice President! This is Madam Policy, a podcast about women shaping policy, creating history. Hello everyone and welcome to Madam Policy. My good colleague and friend, Caitlin Sickles and I are hosting today's episode. Welcome, Caitlin. Thanks, Dee. Glad to be on. Yay! Listen, Caitlin and I are thrilled to welcome Chris Thompson, the CEO of Calvary Women's Services. Calvary is an organization that's been transforming the lives of women experiencing homelessness in Washington, DC for decades. Chris, it is great to see you. Welcome. I am beyond excited to be with you two today. Thank you. Yay. So I want to tell everybody before we jump in that Caitlin and I have both volunteered at Calvary and have each served as board president of the organization. And I think I can speak for both of us when I say those were ⁓ extraordinary opportunities. It's an extraordinary organization and the team of people with whom you work and who you have on your boards are just amazing. So thank you for the opportunity. And I know we both really enjoyed the experience and like to continue working with Calvary. So folks, I'm going to tell you a little bit about Chris. First of all, she is a superstar. Chris has led Calvary for more than 30 years. Is that real? Is it really 30 years that you've led Calvary? I was 16 when I started. That's how the numbers go. That's what I thought. thought you were 10. Okay, I got it now. close. A phenom. All right. Of course, prodigy. But you have grown the organization into a comprehensive multi-site operation that provides housing, health services, education, and wraparound services, long-term support to help women find stability, independence, and a home. Listen, everyone, her approach has always been deeply intentional. addressing not just immediate needs, but the underlying barriers that women face. And we're going to talk about some of those later today, from mental health to employment to long-term independence. And her leadership, and we've witnessed it, ⁓ has been tested in very real time. Just last year, a gas explosion next door to Calvary's Good Hope housing site forced the evacuation of more than 30 women and staff, just minutes before the blast. Despite significant damage and displacement, Chris and her team ensured that every woman was safe, quickly relocated and supported through the crisis. And then she mobilized the community to rebuild and reopen the site. Extraordinary leadership and extraordinary strength. That moment, like so much of her work, reflects what Calvary is all about. Not just providing shelter, but delivering stability, dignity, and of course, hope. Chris, we're really excited to have you here today. And if you're up for it, we're just going to jump in with questions. Does that sound good? Sounds great. I'm ready. All right. Why don't you start? You know, when I joined the board of Calvary, I remember taking the tour with you, which was so exciting. And I asked you to explain to me how Calvary was different than other organizations in this space. And everyone does an extraordinary job. But what you really highlighted at that time was your holistic model supporting women experiencing homelessness. So maybe you can lead off with describing to our listeners a little bit about Calvary and how that holistic model, what it is and how it distinguishes Calvary. Absolutely. As you said, we've been around for a long time and I think we've honed a model that ensures that women who are experiencing homelessness or who may be fleeing domestic violence are really able to make changes in their lives. And so from the earliest days of the organization, there was a commitment to mental health, to women's mental health, women's health. This recognition that homelessness is a moment in time, a crisis moment in a woman's life. But that it's all the pieces around it that really matter and that we really need to be supporting and addressing if a woman's going to make the changes she needs to make. So it means therapy on site with a fabulous therapist. means employment services so that women cannot just get the first time job, but also really think about career laddering if they come in and they have a job. It means an education program so that women can... relearn skills or learn new skills, start to see themselves differently as they learn something new and making sure that all of that happens in a really safe environment. none of us can really grow and change if we're feeling panicky or feeling in crisis. So women step into the safe place and then they have access to all these resources. And then they have a fantastic case manager who's going to guide them through a process so that they really can come out the other side, the person they absolutely want to be stronger. better in a job, in housing, kind of all the things that they may wish for themselves. We do that across six different program sites. So we manage both transitional housing and rental assistance programs and permanent supportive housing. And we make sure that at all of those levels of housing, that women have all those resources. And so that's part of what makes us different. I think there's also this special sauce, the magic, that comes from the relationships. So I was over at a program site yesterday and watched a woman come in who was having a lousy day, just a bad day. And one of the staff came out immediately, put her arms around her, asked her what was going on, and assured her that she didn't need to do anything for the rest of the day. She should go downstairs, she should get a glass of water, she should find a bag of chips and get her head together and just feel okay and feel safe. So there's magic to that. And I think that's what I was referring to when I talk about the stability, because it's not just the long-term stability that you were discussing, sort of the infrastructure of stability, but that level of safety gives you stability and it gives you confidence. And that's really part of what ⁓ I recall in some of my first times of being in Calvary and one of the sites was the level of familiarity and friendship among the women who were utilizing Calvary's resources and the the amazing women, the team that you've built that are providing those services. And it's built on respect and it's built on leadership and kindness. And I think that's really important. A thing that has always struck me about Calvary and about the women that Calvary serves is how universal so many of their experiences are. I think before I was closely involved with Calvary, it is easy to have a notion of experiencing homelessness as being something that is so foreign of an experience, something that just that could not happen. And then when you talk to so many of the women that Calvary serves, you're reminded of some fundamental realities. like a quick Google will tell you that like more than 50%, nearly 60 % of Americans do not have savings for a $1,000 emergency, which means like A lot of people are one major financial hardship away from disaster, know, from the bottom totally coming out. And there are so many women that I've met through Calvary for whom that happened. One mistake in a relationship or one trust of the wrong person or one medical emergency that is such a, it could happen to you, you know, and you meet people and you think, geez, I think it's sort of a roundabout way of asking you, Chris, does that resonate with you? Like, is that what maybe keeps you focused on the Calvary Mission? And how do you think we can, I think as an organization, do a better job of communicating how real the homeless experience is in DC and in other cities? Absolutely. think it strikes me when you say that, Kaitlin, I think about women who have joined this ⁓ new group therapy that we're doing that's focused specifically on women who are in our programs because they've experienced domestic violence, that that was the reason for their homelessness. And the group is focused, you know, is really trying to hone in on economic abuse. And so it's all fine and good that we start to talk about financial literacy and how to save and how to get out from under bad credit and all those things, all important things. But if at the heart of it, you've experienced abuse, someone has made you vulnerable by, you know, you signed the lease and then they kicked you out or you had to leave because they were violent. or as a family member, the, maybe you're the mom in the family and you've had to manage the finances for so many people for so long. And the end result is you end up with so much less and less able to then care for yourself. And so, you know, really trying to support women as they're really dealing with that real challenge. And I think that is a universal. That is, yes. I that's an absolute universal. that women carry the load, women carry the financial load. And even if it's not with the actual dollars, it's the burden of how are we going to make things happen? How are we going to pay the rent? How are we going to cover the medical bills? That's universal, absolutely. so I think when, know, that's absolutely, can see, enlivens me, helps me really think about the ways that women can empower women and that women across financial spectrums, different races, all the different experiences can understand together that they're just our vulnerabilities that exist. And if we don't stand together and stand strong, we're not able to overcome those individually or corporately. So then if we go from the universal experience to the DC experience, the city that we all live in and in our communities, homelessness is really at epidemic rates. You know, it really, during the COVID pandemic, we saw the numbers climb, they haven't gone down the way I think people expected or hoped that they would. Can you give us a sense of how the city is managing our neighbors who are experiencing homelessness and what is sort of from a policy perspective too, how the city is approaching that reality? Sure, I think. What we know from the data over these last two years is that while there's been a decrease in the number of families and single men who are experiencing homelessness, that we've seen an increase in the number of single women experiencing homelessness over those two to three years. And that, again, is, of course, who Calvary specifically serves. so seeing an increase, we used to be about 25 % of the population experiencing homelessness. We're now over 30 % of the population. And so, absolutely, we're in crisis. And as you all know, I mean, there's lots of reasons for that. I was in a conversation yesterday with a colleague who was explaining to me the ways in which affordable housing, the challenges in affordable housing are just so increasingly real, that sort of Class A and Class B housing, which is sort of luxury and middle housing, rent is declining, which for the first time since COVID in the district. And yet Class C housing is staying flat. So people who have the least income and are living in the least favorable housing and the affordable housing are seeing no decline in the cost. And so there are so many policy changes that would need to happen and changes to kind of how the economics are playing out in our city for us to really see some shift in that as we go through this year in a particularly challenging budget year, I think. So Chris, I wanted to ask you about the housing itself. Do we need more housing? Or do we need a different type of housing? Or do we need different policies? Or is it a combination of everything? It's probably a combination of those things. I think if you look at like Class C housing, again, while the rates are staying flat for that, rent is staying flat for that, you're also looking at housing that's older, that's been on the market longer, that probably isn't as well maintained because it doesn't have to be. And so, you know, even if then I can afford that, as someone who has a very low income, that may not be a long-term place to stay because it may not be up to standard. It may not be kind of a long-term solution. And so I think the ways in which we ensure that affordable housing is actually safe and long-term and viable for families and individuals is a critical thing that the city needs to be focusing on and the housing authority needs to be much more stringent in what... standards it's expecting from developers and from landlords. I think there do have to be a variety of models. People who are very low income, who are working every day 40 to 50 hours a week, but at minimum wage, are not paying $3,000 a month for their family to have an apartment. so absolutely there have to be subsidies. There have to be ways that we're supporting people to live stably in housing and not to have the cycle of homelessness that's... that's challenging families and challenging individuals in the ways that it is. So it is April 1st. We are now into April of 2026. It is National Volunteer Month. And I know a question that I am asked all the time, Kaitlin is asked all the time, and Chris, I am confident you are asked all the time is, what is the role of a volunteer? What can a volunteer do in the community, specifically with Calvary, to help address some of these issues? And let me say at the outset, I think a lot of people think there are only one or two things they can do to volunteer, but really you have a variety of needs. And I'm thinking here of some of the courses that you support, the healthcare that you support. Can you talk a little bit about that? I think it would be very interesting for folks. Sure. I was over at a program site yesterday and I would have crossed paths with four different people doing four different kinds of volunteering. Good. One of them was ⁓ person who leads a meditation class. he is an insight meditation meditator, leader, facilitator, and was leading a group and has been doing that for a long time. And watching him interact with women who are either in some state of crisis, but also just needing to find that calming presence of being with other people. Like, what a gift, what a gift to be able to bring the skills that you have, the experience that you have into a setting like ours. I crossed paths with two women who were members of the women's auxiliary at a church just around the corner from Calvary. And they were carrying in boxes and boxes of toiletries that they had collected from church members and from the women's auxiliary in particular. And so they had a tour and they were bringing in their boxes and they were learning about ways that small gifts like that provide both education for the women that they're in this auxiliary with, but also are a way that they're impacting them women. immediately in their community. Church is literally just around the corner from Calvary. And then I interacted with an intern who came on as an intern from one of the local universities who's doing communications work with us. ⁓ And so found again a way for some mutual benefit. She's excited to learn about comms and be able to put some skills to use. And we're getting, you know, fantastic free labor from somebody who's got great energy and great ideas. And so you know, there's so many ways that you can contribute and support. We have meals that are provided every weekend by volunteers. I'm always mindful, of the ways that you and your family would come with Saturday breakfast. I think because you're smarter than everyone else, you knew that the Saturday morning breakfast sandwiches were going to be the biggest hit. And in fact, they were. That was so great. The response really was over disproportionate to the action. just, I want to interject on that. All of this really resonates with me because, know, Chris, we talked about this all the time, but I have been a women's advocate, you know, my entire college and adult life, and I guess college is quasi-adult. ⁓ And I had been doing things at the national scale. I've been doing women's equality work at the global scale. And when you asked me, why do you want to be on the board of Calvary, I said, because I want to do something in my community. And you really connect volunteers and your team and the community in very meaningful ways. And that little girl, my daughter, who was helping serve breakfast on Saturday mornings, which was her favorite thing in the world, is going to college next year, which is crazy. But Calvary really shaped who she became because of the people she met. she didn't really do a whole lot of the serving of the sandwiches. She walked around and sat with people and chatted up everybody and had a ball. And she really met some amazing women and heard some amazing stories and shared some of her own. And it was very important. And I think that's meaningful. That level of volunteerism is meaningful. Not unlike your daughter, up in a family where volunteerism was just assumed. so worked alongside my parents in Habitat for Humanity houses. There was no reason I couldn't hang dry wall with my dad. So you just did those things. You found ways to engage in your community. And so I think for me, that's my poor children have been ⁓ asked to do lots of things at Calvary, but also have done their own sorts of volunteer opportunities as well. mean, it really is how do you ground yourself in the community in which you live? How do you make a difference? But also how do you ensure that you know people? who don't necessarily look exactly like you or have exactly the same experience as you have. so volunteering is a big part of that. And I think in a post-COVID world where more folks work at home and there's a little bit more isolation, volunteerism is just an enormous way to find yourself way more grounded in the community in which you live. Excellent. One of the things I want to raise as part of this conversation, Dee, you pointed out we are now at the beginning of April. April also brings Calvary's single biggest fundraising event of the year. Calvary hosts the annual HOPE Awards. The HOPE Awards, of course, is an opportunity for Calvary to recognize supporters in the community, community partners, and deliver some awards, and also to shine the spotlight on women who have completed Calvary's programs and successfully built new. and stable lives, which is a wonderful event. It's also a big fundraising event for Calvary. And of course, fundraising is critical to the mission. I wonder, Chris, if you want to speak a little bit to a couple of things here. One is the role of fundraising, the role of private giving, particularly in a world in which some of the public support for organizations like Calvary government support is lessening. It's just is being removed and focus on other projects. if you could speak to the role of private fundraising and how organizations like Calvary manage to keep the lights on and the doors open in a ⁓ really complicated economic time. Well, that's a small question, Kaitlyn. Yeah, so if you could just give the key to that. that would be great. Absolutely. What first came to mind when you started the question, I was thinking to myself, as people come on Calvary's board and the conversation is, why do you want to be on Calvary's board? We quickly get to, and how do you feel about fundraising? so most people respond with anxiety because there's that immediate, I am going to have to ask my friends and family for money and I don't want to do that. But I think what ends up happening for most board members and the two of you are in you know, incredible examples of this is you realize that fundraising is really about telling stories and it is about linking people who want to do good with their money with a mission that does good in the world and in their community. And so it's helping make that connection for people. When you can do that, that feels great too. Like that's a win-win for everybody because it really does sort of extend the commitment you've made to an organization. knowing that you're bringing other people to that table and to that mission. At Calvary, we fundraise about 50 % of our annual revenue, which is a heavy lift and means that we rely on diverse funding sources. So local philanthropy, increasingly some national philanthropy. We look to corporate sponsors and corporate supporters and major donors and individuals. And so the HOPE Gala in particular is our opportunity to bring together corporate partners. and many of our major donors to both celebrate the work of the organization and to celebrate and honor the people who are recipients of the awards, the HOPE Award. And so that event is, you know, it's a significant fundraiser in our year. It's also in a lot of ways our homecoming event. It's our opportunity to bring our major donors together and to help remind them and to have them remind each other why they're a part of this organization and this Calvary community. And so people respond generously and excitedly to a live auction that I'm told is like no other in the It's so good. It's so good. It's so good. Says the woman who has a guitar hanging on her wall because someone bought it at the auction. You got to do what you got to do, Chris. You do. You do. It's all about the fundraising in the end. I mean, you know, this, it's a tight environment. mean, we are going into local budget season, anxiously awaiting the mayor to drop the budget, which of course is a little bit delayed. We all thought we were going to see that today. Anticipating, we have been told explicitly as organizations serving people experiencing homelessness that there will be cuts to the Department of Human Services budget for fiscal year 27. And so we go into budget advocacy in a very different place than we have in recent years. It's less about trying to direct resources to projects and growth and new opportunity and more about defining baseline and what can't we lose. Those are the conversations I've been in over the last two months. so it makes the private fundraising even that much more important. It is a reminder, of course, though, that private dollars are not going to replace what government provides. And so we are certainly in a time where advocacy is more critical for organizations, even organizations like Calvary, where we don't have staff who are specifically tasked with doing advocacy. so leaning into different skill sets, it maybe ties back into how do people volunteer for this organization and how do we get expertise from folks like the two of you at Bracewell to really expand our skills and the opportunities. available to us to do policy and advocacy work. think all of those are really good points. One thing I wanted to sort of draw a line under is on the giving side, you know, one thing that always strikes me about Calvary is that while 50 % of the organization's operating budget comes from fundraising, still small dollar donations make a huge difference. I always am struck by the ⁓ brochure information that Calvary puts together where they equate a donation to a service provided to a woman in need. And we're talking about $50 donations, $100 donations, and what that can provide in terms of services and support. And I always think of Keisha, who is the chief fundraising officer, chief development officer rather, at Calvary, who said one time, we need these donations, we use this money to do things like buy mattresses, nobody should have to sleep on a used mattress. And like, yeah, you know? And so, you know, while we talk about fundraising in these huge sums and that is critically important, it's still small dollar gifts that people can take out of their weekly and monthly budgets that are making meaningful impact. And I think you, Chris, and your whole staff, like Keisha, do a really good job of articulating that. That is true. so I'm just going to take a moment for a little advertisement right now, which is that the Hope Awards, the gala, April 16, everyone should come. It's super fun. It is so much fun. And you get to meet so many of the women with Calvary. And I think that you'll love that. Also, you should be following Calvary on Instagram. and you should go to their website because they list several different events that they host throughout the year. So if you need something smaller than a gala, although you should do the gala, you can also do those. So anyway, that's my little announcement. It's an organization that you should get involved with. You will love it. I agree. love that. All right. So Chris, tell me you've done a lot. You've faced a lot of challenges. I want to hear a little bit about your journey. How did you get to Calvary? And tell me about a challenge that you have faced in the past and how you overcame it. This, by the way, everyone, is our portion of the show called Chris is a Leader. Learn. Go. So I found my way to Calvary, as we mentioned, when I was a young child and came by way of, again, sort of long experience in volunteerism, significant experience in my early and mid-20s. around kind of really justice-focused and global ecumenical work with the World Council of Churches, which I served on the governing body. And so in that experience was really engaged around women's advocacy and global women's advocacy. I co-founded an ecumenical young women's leadership council. And so it really was this time and space in my early 20s where I was really felt like finding my voice as a woman and finding my space as a woman. At the same time, I was in graduate school. I was at the University of Maryland studying urban policy and specifically doing a master's thesis on housing policy and started doing research on a local organization here in DC. so, you know, all of these things were sort of happening at the same time. And I got to the end of the degree and was doing fundraising for a small nonprofit as my kind of pay the bills gig. and realized, ⁓ it turns out I know how to do this. I know how to tell stories. I know how to write. And so maybe I'm going to do this for a minute before I go work for the feds because I'm here in DC. I've just gone through a policy program here in the DMV. Of course, that's what I'm going to do. you're going to do. Yeah. Yeah. So all my colleagues, friends were doing. So that was my game plan. And so maybe I'll just do this nonprofit thing for half a second. So applied for a job and landed at Calvary Women's Services. And it was... the moment of realizing all of it could come together. Everything. I could fundraise. I could focus on women's issues. I could think about housing. I could do the things I know how to do and was interested in doing. The things that I didn't know how to do, mean, that list was incredibly long, which probably topped by human resources, things I didn't know. That's hard. Yeah, I would go in my office, I'd be in this little office and close the door and be like in tears in my office thinking like, ⁓ my gosh, the things I don't know how to do. I'm too young to have this job and too inexperienced. So yeah, so I mean, that's how I got where I am in this position and in the work that I've been doing. And the passion, think, you know, when you stay in a role for a long time or stay with an organization for a long time, you really do. recreate the role and recreate the organization over time. And I think of that in your career, Dee. You've rebuilt your career multiple times. I feel like I have done that at Calvary as well. And it waxes and wanes as maybe you have to focus on family for a period of time. ⁓ But yeah, I think the connection and the passion around housing and women has never changed for me. When I think about challenges, I think back in these early days, when I was with the World Council of Churches and I would be in a governing board meeting and I was, you know, I was just young. I was so young. for the first time really sort of having this experience, consistent experience of not feeling like I was heard or seen. And that real recognition of like, ⁓ gosh, how do you, what do you do with this? And then having the realization that if I don't feel heard and seen as a privileged white woman from the United States in this global setting, the experiences of the women of color around this table are just amplified. sort of having to figure out what the heck to do with that. And so, you know, I think my learning when I look back is I really watched other women, women who were my mentors then, make space for women and make sure there were seats at the table for women. And most importantly, I think, make sure that they were resourced when they were at the table. So I have this great memory of one of my mentors who just passed recently, got me invited to a meeting that I was probably not really qualified to be at, like seriously not qualified to be at. And I go to this meeting and she's prepped me. And so I'm not going to, you know, I don't, I don't have to lean in on all of it. but I'm clear on what my piece is. And so it wasn't just making sure the space was there, it was making sure I knew what I wanted to say when I got there. And so that's a critical piece. And I'm going to use this as a segue to say that is why D. Martin is this year's Hope Awardee. Because that is what you have honed. thank face is red. Yeah, it's not just sort of creating the space, but it's making sure that everything's prepped. I mean, I remember in our days when you first came out as board chair, and I was foolishly working with whoever had been before you and stepped into the board meeting. And I remember you looking at me, waiting for me to give you notes. And I was like, ⁓ OK, I didn't prep you. Okay, now I got it. ⁓ And that huge learning around, if we want to be visible and present and have the strong voice we want to have, don't just step in. You got to know what you're stepping in for. Yeah. No, I think, look, that is exactly right. And it is what, and Caitlin does this too, it is what we try to do whenever we promote, elevate, highlight, help, support. We also have to give tools and resources for what that looks like and what that means. And being a role model is great, but we're not always, you perfect. And so sitting down and taking the time to prep someone in advance, I think is one of the best things that you can do for someone, at least to let them know what to expect so they're not nervous. Yeah. Well, it's where the confidence comes from, right? Right. So Marianne says to me, here's like, here's where I think you're going to go with this. And here's some ideas to think about. And then I knew, Miriam thought I knew what I was doing. You know, like the story of my life. Right? mean, the confidence that comes from that. then you're, you know, there's not the like the panic you have to live up to that necessarily. There's maybe a little bit of that. Absolutely. This feeling of I can do this. Somebody else thinks I can do this. And so I'm going to try to, I'm going to try my darnedest. No, that does mean a lot. And you're like, you want to pull the person aside and be like, you remember fake it till you make it. Well, I've made it and I faked it. So now what am I doing? Yeah. Yeah. I think there's something too about, ⁓ and you know, Chris, I think you have this in spades and I've certainly seen it so often in D as well, which is authentic leadership. Like you spend so much of your time being a champion for Calvary and you know, you're out. talking to people and talking about the work you do and you share the experiences of the women that Calvary serves. And I've seen you give a variation on that speech, I don't know, a hundred times. And every time what comes through is a genuine, earnest belief in the organization and a belief in the women that you serve, I'd say you cried 90 % of them. And that's true. That's so true. Because it is, it is that you are telling the story of the passion of your life, of that work, you know? And so I think you can't fake that. You know, can fake knowledge of a topic, you can fake enough credibility to get in the room, but when you get the floor, if it's not authentic, if you don't really believe it, if you don't like that. People know that right away. Like the authenticity and earnestness, you gotta have that. And I think, you know, so much of Calvary's success has depended on you being able to deliver that every time. The other part of it though, is that the women that you serve have access to you. They have access to the women that are also in leadership in the organization and they can see that, right? if you are an authentic and vulnerable and earnest leader, it gives them space to say, you know, to provide their own stories and all of that. So I think that part of it, you know, I hear both of you, both women that I admire very much saying, ⁓ fake it till you make it. And I'm like, yeah, but very little of it is fake. Let's be honest. No, that's true. But sometimes you feel that way. And I that's, you know, sometimes you just, you don't. you don't know what you know and it's helpful when someone else sees it in you. No doubt. I think that that's what Chris does. Caitlin, I see you do that all the time too. You do it with me and I'm grateful for it. And so I do think that that is mentorship to a certain extent. Chris, we have one final question for you. But before we do that, Emily, don't be mad at me. By the way, everyone, Emily Korbrowski is our amazing producer, but I'm taking these headphones off because I have to get something off of my shelf to share with our guests. Hang on. Emily would never be mad. Confused maybe, but not mad. What can be on the shelf? can be on the shelf? Ooh. Okay, this, people can't see, but this is from, was painted by one of the women of Calvary whenever I left the board. And on the back of it is a beautiful poem. I won't read the whole thing, but it ends with, therefore for me, a new night, a new moon. a new day, a new sun. And that's what Calvary meant to this woman and it changed her life. And having this in my office has changed my life. And so my thanks is to Calvary, it's to you, Chris, it's to you, Caitlin, for your leadership. And it is to this woman who I understand now has a home and is an independent and employed and is doing extraordinarily well. I just wanted, before we end, I just wanted to say thank you for this. It's very meaningful to me. I'm so glad you shared that story. Me too. by that painting a million times. did not know that that's where it came from. You'll see it again at the Hope Awards. Okay. I feel like we glossed over that announcement a little bit, and I have to say it's because I didn't know how we were doing that announcement. So I think we should just linger on it for a second, which is we've talked about the Hope Award. We've talked about the Gala. This year's Hope Award honoree, as Chris said, is D. Martin so deserved. Thank you. And the Hope Award, I think what we say about it is that it recognizes people for outstanding service and leadership in the community. That's taken lots of different forms over the years. ⁓ Calvary has recognized members of Congress. Calvary has recognized the great civil rights activist Dolores Huerta. and many others with the HOPE Award. This year's recognition, and I'm close friends and, you know, we work tightly together. ⁓ Tina Stowe, who is the current Calvary board chair, and I think what she would say is that this year's recognition for Dee is both in recognition of Dee's volunteerism for Calvary, Dee's fundraising for Calvary, her work on as an advocate for Calvary, and then what Calvary has come to refer to as the D tree of people who come to Calvary because of D. I've served on the board, our former colleague, Emily Stipe is on the board now. We're forever growing the pipeline of people who know and love D and will come to know and love Calvary. So I think for all of those reasons, ⁓ D is receiving the award. I'm confident that ⁓ that Tina and the board would say that for sure. Well, thank you for that. I'm, you know, that's just a paying it forward and sharing the wealth kind of thing because it's been, it was such an extraordinary opportunity for me and to get to work with Chris and the team at Calvary that I really just want everybody to have that chance. And so I'm grateful to all of you for joining the board and being on the board. And we're just going to continue the pipeline. So thank you. Thank you for saying all that. I appreciate it. I will say this. You know, hope is the reason that I can't play poker, right? Because I, you know, especially in Texas Hold'em, you really hope should not be your strategy, right? Like you should just know when to hold them and when to fold them, right? But hope is so important to me because it is what inspires a plan and it is what inspires the next step. And every step that Calvary enables a woman to take is a step toward independence and having a home and a life of stability. And that's why it's just the thrill of a lifetime to be honored with a Hope Award. So thank you. You should be prepared as well that there are lots of Calvary supporters who regularly come to the Hope Gala who are ecstatic that you are to be honored, one of whom is flying in for the event and will most certainly be the loud voice cheering out in the audience because he always does. Is it Waspie? It is Waspie. not even make it to the stage because I'm going to hug every single person in that room. Well, that is exciting. Thank you. Thank you so much. right. So Chris, an extraordinary journey you've had and work that you do. How old were you when you were on the world board? I was 23. Okay. I served for seven years. 23 to Then this question is perfect because I would like to know what advice you would give your 24-year-old self. I would say quit thinking that other people are even paying any attention to you or judging what you're doing. That's so true. Nobody's actually paying attention to each other at all. We think they are. We think people are wondering what we're wearing. We think people are wondering why we're taking the job we're taking. We get all caught up in that. Yeah. And we probably still think that now, years later, but certainly at 24, I wish I had known Nobody really cares. Like, get over that. Because I think if you can get over that, you are freer to make the kinds of decisions you want to make and to not second guess the decisions that you're making. So I have kids now who are in this age range of their early 20s trying to make decisions about their futures. And I think at times getting caught up in what should I do because it's prestigious or what should I do because I can have a stable income or what Yeah, those are all important pieces of it. But to be at all motivated by trying to keep up with anybody else or trying to ensure that you're somehow achieving something you think someone else thinks you should do, that's just not the way to go. So I think it's a life lesson. Again, I think it applies at 24. I think it applies at 44. I think it will probably apply at 64 when I find myself there. It's a long way away. It's fine. Quit thinking other people are thinking about you. I think that's great. That is great advice. Caitlin, I'll speak for both of us. This is a Women's Leadership podcast, but I'm going to quote my late father who used to say, honey, you would care a lot less about what people think about you if you realized how little they actually do. Yes. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. That's right. He said that to me often between the ages of four and 24. Didn't stick, but here we are talking about it still. There should be a book of Steve Andrews quotes, by the way. There should. I love that. should. love that. Well, and I don't think like in hindsight, I don't think it stopped me from doing the things I was going to do. But gosh, what a like mind space that stuff takes up. Like how do you just get out of that? No, that's true. Well, that is excellent advice. Chris? As always, you're a mentor, a friend, a leader. I admire you greatly. So thank you for being here and taking your time. I know you have an incredibly busy day, so thank you so much for your time. I can't thank the two of you enough. I can't think of two women who I admire more and who have taught me big things and small things, ways to start and step into meetings, ways to prep, ways to think about communications much more effectively. So thank you for all that and thank you for always showing up, for always being good friends and good leaders. Appreciate you. Thanks, Chris. Thank you. Thanks everyone for listening to Madam Policy. I think it's another great episode. Please download or subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. And rate and review the show, which is really helpful to have other listeners find it. If you have someone that you think would be a great guest for Madam Policy, please send us their name. You can tweet at us, find us on Instagram and contact us by the links in the bios. Thanks so much. This podcast was recorded in the studios of policy.