Erin Brockovich talks water, self-doubt and ‘always banking on the people’ ahead of Spokane speech

Erin Brockovich knew something wasn’t right in Hinkley.

The paralegal couldn’t put a finger on it, but her trips to the small Southern California desert town while handling a real estate case for a family there in the 1990s told her something bigger was going on.

“I mean, I could feel something was wrong,” Brockovich said in an interview with The Spokesman-Review. “The trees were telling me a story. The animals were telling me a story. Only one person was really telling me a story at that time; everybody else either didn’t believe it or didn’t want to talk about it.”

Brockovich wasn’t formally trained in law, but her father had taught her the sanctity of nature, while her mother instilled in her the “gift of sticktoitiveness.”

“Something was wrong, and I tried to figure out what on earth was the common theme,” she said. “And that’s when I was like, “Oh my gosh, it’s the water.’”

Her dedication ended up paying off – literally. Brockovich’s work with lawyer Ed Masry helped secure a $333 million settlement from Pacific Gas & Electric Company for tainting the town’s water supply, the largest direct-action payout for injuries in U.S. history at the time. Her story eventually made it to the big screen in 2000’s “Erin Brockovich,” which was nominated for Best Picture at the Academy Awards and saw Julia Roberts win Best Actress for portraying Brockovich.

Now, Brockovich will be the keynote speaker for the Women Helping Women Fund’s “Give Like a Woman” event May 19 at the Spokane Convention Center.

“Erin uses her platform to spread positive messages of personal empowerment and to encourage others to stand up and make a difference. We can’t wait to hear from her,” the organization says on its website.

In her eponymous movie, Brockovich is portrayed as equally dogged in her pursuit of justice and warm with the residents of Hinkley, using her people skills to get an entire small town to confide in her their most intimate health nightmares linked to the toxic water.

Brockovich said the movie is extremely accurate, and those soft skills were a huge part of getting the case.

“They want to make you think it’s weak,” she said.

But Brockovich, 65, drew on her own experience growing up in Kansas to summon the emotional state it took to persevere in Hinkley.

“They weren’t being seen or being heard, and I felt that injustice my whole life because I’m dyslexic,” she said. “I started to recognize my own suppression and what was happening to these people, and I just dug deep on my instincts, believing in what I saw, believing in what the people told me, and I just wasn’t going to back off my position. And that’s how it all started.”

Back in Kansas, Brockovich had a teacher who recognized her intelligence and let her take tests orally so that she wouldn’t write the answers down wrong because of her dyslexia. Her GPA improved, and the young Brockovich – then Erin Pattee – learned she could succeed with a little lateral thinking.

“It’s about trusting yourself, believing in yourself and finding the courage to move another way around a situation,” she said.

Still, there were times dealing with the PG&E case that Brockovich had to take stock of whether the grueling work was worth it.

“I never saw my kids, I barely made any money, and then it dawned on me, you know, I loved the people, I love the idea that they could have a better environment, I loved the idea that I had a job, and it hit me that, oh my gosh, my motivation, my why, my reason is just simply because I love the earth and I love them, and I loved the idea that there might be a better future for my kids,” she said.

The historic case and the movie it bore also led the real-life Brockovich to have something of an identity crisis: The world suddenly knew Erin Brockovich, but what about Erin Pattee?

Society may put you in one box, she said, but “there will be something in your life that will wake you up, and you’ll start punching your way out.”

Brockovich likened that process of personal growth to the one that turns a caterpillar into a butterfly.

“It must dissect itself first, and this is looking at that person in the mirror and forgiving yourself, loving yourself, embracing yourself for all the trespasses, mistakes or whatever verbiage we want to use. We all go through it, and we’re terrified to see that person … I was terrified for a long time to see that person because of this dyslexia and all the labels that got put upon me. But what I learned was, my dyslexia was my gift, and it was my strength, and I had to recognize the power of myself and my own shortcomings and get over it already.”

As for the environment, Brockovich said she’s “somewhat discouraged” to see not that much has changed in society some 30 years after Hinkley.

“We are water, and I just think that we’ve disconnected from this natural world. And when it suffers, don’t think that you’re not going to,” she said.

Brockovich goes back to water when she’s feeling lost and watches the power of the ocean. She said she’s looking forward to seeing Spokane’s natural beauty in the spring.

“It is our duty and it is our obligation and, frankly, it is our honor to protect and defend this incredible planet that we live in,” she said.

As a girl from Kansas, “The Wizard of Oz” has always resonated with her as an allegory.

“Did we buy an illusion? Did we get complacent? They got put to sleep in the poppy fields. And I am wondering if that’s happened to us,” she said. “I don’t think any of us are ever lost. You have a heart, use it. You have a brain, use it. You have a gut, feel it and follow it. And I think we’ll find our way back. As crazy as that sounds, I truly believe it.”

She’s already seen that can happen firsthand in Hinkley.

“It took that entire community to rise up. People think ‘leverage’ is a bad word; no, leverage is you plus your neighbors, plus another neighbor,” she said. “These communities … they’re finding their courage, and they’re standing up in their own backyard, and that’s exactly what it’s going to take.”

“I will always bank on the people,” she said. “And it’s always a privilege and honor for me to watch them rise up.”