A meaningful alternative for county attorney

I may not have been born in Steele County; however, this is my home. I am here because of my mom, M. Esther Sherman. I feel that you need to see her as not just a candidate but a woman. That is why I am going to share a small piece of my story with you. Because who better than me, her daughter, to portray her? She made these eyes from scratch. Raised me to advocate for others and always make a place better than how I found it. I am a living representation of her values… most days. I am still a teenage girl.

All this to say that I know M. Esther Sherman better than anyone else on this earth. Since day one, it has been her and me against the world.

My mom cannot be idle. She has to be learning something; doing something. So, she got an education. Multiple, in fact. Her professors loved her enthusiasm, dark sense of humor, and intellect. She has always had a way with people, despite insisting that she is “not a people person.”

My mother is that she has a will of iron. For example, she runs ultra marathons… for fun. There was a very difficult situation when someone of influence early on in her life told her to give up. She refused. She would never tell someone to stop fighting simply because the fight was hard. Instead, she would stand beside them, reminding them why they started and that they never stand alone.  

As a child, I fought with my mother. I would lash out. I never saw how she fought for me as I would push her away, convinced everyone eventually leaves; yet she never gave up. To this day, I tear up at the cruelty I showed my own mother.

Yet she still fought for me.

My mother has struggled with insomnia her entire life, but during those late nights, she always found a way to keep me housed, fed, cared for, and educated. Looking back, I remember those early years in fragments: the glow of a computer screen in a dark room, the steady clicking of her keyboard, and the quiet certainty that Mom was fighting. One night, she decided to apply to law school.

On days when I didn't have school Mom would take me with her to class, just as she had while attending Boston University. I would listen as I sat drawing quietly next to her, sometimes scribbling out a note asking about something. She would use me to make sure she understood legal concepts. If you can teach it, you know it. 

Law became life. The way our household functioned was remarkably similar to the justice system. Mom was, of course, the Supreme Court. Her roommate was the appellate court. Teachers were the district courts. If I wanted permission to go to a park a little farther than the agreed-upon area, I had better be prepared to plead my case.

There is a story that is both funny and mortifying involving a fourth grader, a cat, an interview, and a lot of alarm that didn't come from a clock. I was somehow both the villain and the protagonist in this particular story—or so I like to tell myself. Somehow, that misadventure resulted in my mother getting a job on the Senate Finance Committee. I would like to see this as my finest work and proof that my shenanigans can have positive outcomes on occasion. In all seriousness, though, that was all her.

She took that interest in taxation from her time there and went to NYU Law School to pursue tax law and added another doctorate to her repertoire. Becoming, as I like to say, Dr. Dr. Master Sherman. Ooooo fancy.

Her time on the Senate Finance Committee sparked her interest in tax law. Tax law is her Roman Empire. To clarify, Roman Empire in this context is something of great interest. That, and trains and plane crashes, volcanoes, and the list goes on, but those are irrelevant. She is a woman of many fascinations, to say the least.

Please do not start her on tax law unless you actually care and have no immediate need to escape. If you do not heed this warning, you risk learning something. Probably several things.  I beg of you: if I am present, give me an exit strategy.

With her experience, she was told she was “overqualified” for other legal positions here in our area, so she started substitute teaching. She eventually became a long-term substitute in a special education class. Once again, my mother, who insists she is “not a people person” found herself loving and advocating for the people around her. It was around that time when she started painting.

Satisfied—allegedly—with her massive education, she did everything she could to give me more than the bare necessities. She gave me passion for color. She gave me curiosity. She surrounded me with people from all walks of life. She gave me a reason to believe the world was bigger than whatever difficult thing was happening in front of us.

She raised me to wake up every day and give everything I have to the work in front of me—even when it is difficult. She taught me that we have a responsibility to leave our community cleaner, safer, and better than we found it.

My mother has a way of drawing people in, forming deep connections wherever she goes. There is a warmth about her that makes people feel safe, seen, and understood.  I have watched countless people open to her, even upon first meeting. When she had to work multiple jobs to keep a roof over our heads and food in the fridge, that same sense of connection meant I was never without a community of people ready to care for me, for her.

She taught me that sometimes there is nothing you can do to bring light into another person's life. So, you sit with them in the darkness. You make sure they aren't alone. Because she knows what it is like to be alone. That is the kind of person M. Esther Sherman is.

My mother is a complicated, brilliant, occasionally infuriating, hilarious, stubborn, compassionate, endlessly curious human being who has lived more lives than a barn full of cats.  She is a lawyer, an artist, a storyteller, a survivor, an advocate, and a force to be reckoned with. But above all, she is my mother—and the reason I keep trying.

Now I'm here fighting for her. I am part of the Residents for M. Esther Sherman Committee. We seek to provide the residents of Steele County with a meaningful alternative, a choice in their representation.

There is a whole lot more to M. Esther Sherman than any label could ever contain. I believe she would work herself to the very marrow of her bones to improve this community—to provide sound legal counsel and to fight, as she always has and always will, for Steele County. While no title could ever fully encompass who she is, the role of Steele County Attorney would give her another opportunity to do what she has always done best: stand up for others and serve the community she calls home.

Leah Sherman is the daughter of M. Esther Sherman, who is running on a write-in campaign for Steele County Attorney.