June 6 is Sweden’s National Day. While the Swedish Club celebrates with music and dinner, I’m left reflecting on what I lost when I stood up for myself and others and was shut out.
Today, June 6, the Swedish Club is full of smiles and songs, celebrating Sweden’s National Day. I should be there, too. For years, I was part of that community—cooking, singing, sharing laughter over pancake breakfasts, holiday galas, and Friday night dinners with music and dancing. But I’ve been shut out. My membership was taken away, my employment ended, and I’ve been barred from the Club where I once belonged.
I lost my place at the Club in March 2023 because I stood up—not just for myself, but for members and employees who were treated unfairly. No Black employee was treated well, and employees of color faced the same. Many of them left while I was still there. Paul Jefferson, the Black bartender, was forced out by one of the defendants, Sarah Alaimo. Members like Helen Lowe and Tricia Charles (RC’s mother, who was banned by Kristine Leander), and employees like Jared, Malin Jonsson (at the time), and RC—who suffered a brain injury on the job and was pushed aside instead of helped.
I brought these issues to the Board and more. Including how Christine was mistreating employees and ignoring the financial well-being, health, and safety in the kitchen, and multiple financial problems. She was engaged in extensive deficit spending and operating the Club at a deficit—problems that were never properly addressed.
I’ve missed the people, the events, the dinners, the music, and the pancake breakfasts. The litigation is far from a triumph—it’s a sad commentary on things that shouldn’t have happened to me and others. It remains an ongoing black mark against the Club—its failure to acknowledge its harm to others and to reconcile with the many it harmed. That’s the real story, and that’s what makes me sad tonight.