Jobs well done

She traded one-liners with Bill Cosby and zinged President Bill Clinton. She teased Arnold Schwarzenegger and accidentally kissed Colin Powell right on the smacker. On a dare, she once called Ronald Reagan "Ronnie." But Olene Walker's favorite moment during her long political career might have been an exchange with a nameless boy.

She was being driven out of the airport parking lot when she spotted a school bus full of children. She asked her driver to stop the car and approached the bus to say hello. Just then, one of the students yelled, "Hey, it's the governor who makes us read!"

Walker, who has stressed school reading programs during her brief term as governor, delights in telling this story. "That's the best success you can have," she says, laughing. "You wonder if you've made a difference."

That's Walker for you. Successful or not, she has tried to be more than a caretaker for the office since taking over for Mike Leavitt when he left to become director of the Environmental Protection Agency, but it was a lot to ask. Her term as governor will total only 14 months, and she was relegated to lame-duck status for eight of them after Republicans eliminated her in the May state GOP convention.

"I feel like I've got to make every day count," she says.

She points to her work on initiatives that improved the quality and quantity of watersheds across the state, and public lands legislation whose effectiveness won't be known for years. Her literacy programs — perhaps the hallmark of her brief term — have been successful. But her pet project — the appointment of a task force to reform Utah taxes — has stalled. Released in late November, she believes ultimately it will provide a blueprint for Utah's future.

"When I became governor, I felt some stress over the fact that I had a very limited time to accomplish a lot of things," she says. "I didn't want to be known as a caretaker. It would be easy to slip into that mode where you didn't work hard."

There are probably many reasons she didn't get the Republican nomination. She is a moderate and an independent thinker by party standards. Her gender also was undoubtedly a factor, as was her age (she turned 74 on Nov. 5).

So ends a remarkable political career by an accomplished woman who has somehow managed to have it all — the big family, career, education, church and community service — and she's done it with grace, humor, intelligence, hard work and, well, fun.

The only question is: Does this woman sleep?

Answer: Rarely.

The accidental politician