“Traipsing” Around the Country…

---

Tamara, WHY are you constantly “traipsing” all over the country meeting experts, business leaders, celebrities, journalists, filmmakers, and other public figures?

The answer is simple: One of these new friends is going to help make the difference — I just don’t know who.

In a way, the “tapestry” of life is made up of the individual “strands” of people you meet along the way. It’s the conversations you have with those people, the relationships, possibilities, the projects and results achieved that make a difference in the world. All of that grows out of those meetings and conversations. But if you sit home in your house in a mellow town, in a sleepy little neighborhood… there’s no way to know when or if you are ever going to meet anyone! And if you want to make the difference, if you want to make sure the WORLD knows about an important issue, and knows about it in an personal and profound way, well you really need to get out there and meet people!

It is for this reason that I have been “traipsing” around the country this year, leaving my poor dear husband overwhelmed and in charge of our Lead-poisoned kiddos while I try to meet people that may be able to help in one-way or another.

In some cases, the people I meet — just by their mere learning of or more about the issue and seeing how personal it can be (in Robert’s case I used my Niton XRF and found peeling Lead paint on the doors to his offices in Berkeley) — will make a difference.

Adding the consideration of Lead poisoning (and Lead in their environment) to their understanding of the world and the possibilities as to why things might occur as they do — sometimes that “puzzle piece” makes a huge difference all by itself.

Sometimes, in the case of someone as amazing as Robert Reich — who is such a great thinker and listener and is obviously eager, as an educator, to better understand elements of our society with which he may not be intimately familiar (especially those elements that have a significant impact on our economy!) — just sometimes, there is a very great potential for that person’s hearing (and understanding) the message to have a great “ripple effect.” You never know. And you never know how you’re going to get to that next conversation and who that next conversation is going to be with. You have to start somewhere!

Friendship

In all of these “encounters” friendships have been key. To each and everyone of my friends and family who have made the past year possible (including helping to make all of these amazing encounters possible) — Thank you! It is through the vast network of supporters of my work and the incredible collection of friends I have managed to assemble in the last 30 or 40 years (with a little help from Facebook!) that meeting Michael Moore, Oliver Stone, Chandra Wilson, Barbara Roberts, Mariel Hemingway, Jenna Elfman, Ricki Lake, Queen Latifah, Robert Reich and Laila Ali, to name just a few (as well as so many other amazing, interesting,  passionate environmentalists, documentary filmmakers, authors, parent advocates, journalists, scientists, civic leaders and others committed to making a difference) has been possible! It is also through this network of friends that I was able to contact Pete Towshend and Roger Daltry and ask them if we could use their amazing music in the film!

So please think of what respected, powerful, influential, well-connected or otherwise “important” person you may know (a cousin? An old college roomie? The parent of your child’s best friend from pre-school?) and whether or not they might be interested in learning more about the work of the Lead Safe Mama team. I could come test their home and their belongings, share the film and my story and the stories of other mothers across the country, tell them about all of the amazing science and dedicated researchers and medical professionals who have been working on this issue for decades and perhaps they will join the team.

There’s that old “100th Monkey” myth, and I’m not sure how many “monkeys” it will take to tip the scale on Lead-poisoning, but I’m willing (with your support and help) to keep trying until the scales are tipped.

Thank you everyone.

Tamara Rubin
Lead Safe Mama

---

For those new to this website:

Tamara Rubin is a multiple-federal-award-winning independent advocate for childhood Lead poisoning prevention and consumer goods safety, and a documentary filmmaker. She is also a mother of Lead-poisoned children (two of her sons were acutely Lead-poisoned in 2005). Since 2009, Tamara has been using XRF technology (a scientific method used by the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission) to test consumer goods for toxicants (specifically heavy metals — including Lead, Cadmium, Mercury, Antimony, and Arsenic). All test results reported on this website are science-based, accurate, and replicable. Items are tested multiple times to confirm the test results for each component tested. Tamara’s work was featured in Consumer Reports Magazine in February of 2023 (March 2023 print edition).