A Candidate's Solid Home Base

A Corporate Veteran Running for Mayor Recharges in a House in Spring Valley

On a recent spring morning, Marie Johns appears at the door of her Northwest Washington home and welcomes a visiting reporter into the soaring atrium.

Opening her house to press scrutiny is part of Johns's transition from the corporate world to the political arena, where she is making her first bid for elective office as a candidate for District mayor.

As president of Verizon Washington for six years, Johns had a reputation for strong leadership and high polish. These days she rises at dawn to shake hands at subway stops and returns after dark from fundraising dinners and candidate forums. At the end of the day, says the candidate, she likes to kick off her shoes inside the front door. This day, they happen to be tangerine slides.

"When I get home," says Johns, 54, "I feel like I'm back in my nest."

Johns is a woman who seems to have left little to chance in her life, from her corporate success to the groundwork she has laid for her entry into the political arena. Her home, a brick Colonial on a street of closely spaced newer homes in Spring Valley, reflects the same kind of carefully planned attention to detail. Soothing colors of pumpkin, sunshine yellow and sage fill the three floors. The lower level, where she and her husband settle in to listen to music, is painted a calming marine blue. Bold, contemporary furniture sets off paintings, photography, art glass and turned wood bowls collected over more than three decades.

Sitting at the granite center island in her cheerful yellow kitchen, Johns says that her drive-by breakfast of late is a couple of vitamins. But on the morning of a reporter's visit, the house is filled with the aroma of home-baked sour cream cinnamon coffeecake.

"We're willing to do anything that's legal to help us get the message across," says Johns, "including opening up the doors of our home." And the doors of her oven.

The candidate says she has precious little time these days to cook for herself and Wendell Johns, her husband of 35 years.

"I love to cook, especially traditional African American food like candied yams, greens, corn pudding and all that rich, delicious food I could eat all day but can't."

The more typical evening fare: grilled chicken and salad. "I'm struggling with how to be a healthier campaigner. I take carrot sticks and hummus with me to keep my energy level up."

The couple, who have a grown son, moved into the five-bedroom home in 1999. Wendell Johns, 55, retired last year as a vice president at Fannie Mae. There are two fireplaces on the main floor and another upstairs in the spacious master bedroom. There's a fitness room and an eat-in kitchen. And everywhere there are paintings, drawings and sculpture collected over the years.

With days tightly scheduled morning till night -- campaigning on top of meetings as a trustee of Howard University, volunteering at church and serving on the Women's Advisory Board of the Girl Scout Council of the Nation's Capital -- a few things at home fall off the to-do list. Pots of dead plants that didn't make it are disposed of out back in what she calls her plant cemetery. The couple's shared home office, otherwise known as "the Bermuda Triangle," is piled with boxes and papers. Her 15-hour days leave little time to hang out with her husband as he dusts off his favorite Jimi Hendrix CDs.