Joe Doesn't Know: First-Hand Thoughts and Reflections on a "Joyless" Campaign

It was hard. It was tough. It was challenging. It was time-consuming. It was exhilarating. It was thrilling. It was frustrating. It was nerve-wracking. It was scary. It was confusing. It was hopeful. It was terrifying. It was exhausting. In short, it was everything you'd expect a presidential campaign to be.

And it was never joyless.

Despite what former Vice-President Joe Biden may have stated in his recent Vanity Fair interview, I for one, can attest to the fact that the Clinton campaign brought thousands of us great joy along with great sorrow. There were extreme highs and lows, sometimes only hours apart. There was so much beyond our control from what surrogates said, to what the candidates themselves said, to the logistics and weather for campaign events, to the division of time and resources based on what was needed, to the closing and/or reopening of GOTV staging locations, to the last-minute transfer of hundreds of organizers days before Election Day. We did all this, and rolled with the punches, because we believed in that the work we were doing and were willing to do whatever it took to help elect Hillary Clinton as the 45th president of the United States of America.

This kind of work is undeniably difficult. But you don't do it if you don't find joy in the work. For five months, I was able to find great joy despite working 70-80 hours a week in the hot, Florida sun. I was not alone in this as I was part of a Florida team that brought over 600 staff members to the Sunshine State, with 90% of them working as field staff in every corner of the state from Tallahassee to the Keys. In Palm Beach County alone, we had nearly 40 organizers who joined the campaign from places such as California, Texas, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, D.C., and even London. Some organizers had been with the campaign for well over a year and some joined during the last two months. Some took time off from work, others took time off from school, and some, like myself, specifically sought out work on the campaign and rearranged our lives in order to do so. Regardless of how we got there, we were united behind a common cause and that cause was to elect Hillary Rodham Clinton as president of the United States.

http://www.thepeoplesview.net/main/2017/11/5/joe-doesnt-know-first-hand-thoughts-and-reflections-on-a-joyless-campaign