|
Sorry this is so long but please indulge me as I reminisce a bit...
Got an email from my sister today that reminded me of where we were a year ago at this time....She and her friend were “Kerry fairies”, making magnetic Kerry bumper stickers and leaving them at the doorstep of folks with Kerry signs in their yards. She was also doing things like making phone calls, writing letters, etc.....whatever she could do while raising two young children.
I was exchanging emails with a woman at the ACT office near the small PA town where I grew up, making arrangements for the weekend. Living in NYC, extremely blue, I'd decided to go to PA for that last weekend until the election to help out in a real battleground state. I probably spent at least one night of that last week before going making phone calls to some other battleground state.....
It was all so foreign to me, doing this political stuff. Until I'd gotten involved in the draft Clark movement, the closest thing I’d done to getting involved in anything political was to pick up some literature from the Jerry Brown headquarters and go to see Brown speak on an overcast Good Friday morning in 1992. But then I helped draft the General and then I volunteered on his campaign in ways I couldn’t have imagined myself doing just a few months earlier, and then, at Gen Clark’s urging to stay involved and help get John Kerry elected, I worked very hard with redefeatbush and then with ACT NY and then with ACT in PA.
The PA experience was interesting and one I’ll never forget. Although I grew up there, I don’t think alot of people at the office realized that and they looked on me as some kind of outsider coming from “the big city”....until I proved myself to them and made them see I had not forgotten my "roots". Saturday I spent about 12 hours at the office, making phone calls, helping organize driving teams for Election Day, etc....and I got an assignment for Tuesday, driving canvassers in my home town. Sunday morning I drove the route with my two young nieces, learning roads in town where I grew up that I hadn’t known existed....and then about 8 or 9 more hours at the office and out on the streets canvassing with a lovely woman whose son was serving in Iraq. I don't know if he made it back OK or not....
Monday I missed seeing Teresa speak because I was conducting a session for more Tuesday drivers. Too bad, as she wowed everyone who'd gotten the chance to go. When I got to the drivers class, these two older Teamster guys were giving me a bit of a hard time because they knew I was from NYC...nothing awful but I could tell they didn’t exactly take to me coming there from NY....until I told them that I came from a union household, that I went to University on a Teamsters scholarship. Then they couldn’t help me enough...And then another late night preparing the driving teams for Tuesday.
Tuesday, after taking my mother to vote, I spent a good portion of the day at our staging area, waiting for a busload of volunteers who never did make it because of an accident on the highway. I got to know some more of the drivers, all area people who, again, didn’t exactly trust me until we were trying to figure out where a certain road was and one of the guys said something about my family house and the four daughters who'd lived there and I said “That’s my house. I’m one of those girls! That’s the house I grew up in!”
Finally, we set out to canvass. Because of the shortage of volunteers, I ended up knocking on doors in my hometown while one fo the other drivers drove. My mom wasn’t on the list to be canvassed...She was classified as a “super Dem” already. :) The weather forecast had been iffy but it turned out to be a lovely day...kind of overcast but warm. My partner and I worked so hard, trying to get all of the doors, trying between the two of us to do the work that had been set aside for six volunteers. We were the last van out on the road and they had to call us back in. I was feeling good...Most people I had spoken to had already voted and everyone they knew was voting...for Kerry.
We got back to the staging area to be greeted by a worker with really good poll numbers in important states. For one glorious moment there, we thought we’d pulled it off, thought we really did it...and now, with the polls closed, a light rain began to fall. I know this sounds goofy but it felt as if we were blessed by the heavens or something.
Then nail biting time as I went home for a bit and my Mom and I watched what looked like a sure thing begin to disintegrate. I went to my ACT office’s “victory” party and was so pleased when the drivers, upon seeing me enter, called me over to their table. These were rough and tumble folks who knew each other well and didn’t let just anyone into the circle...I felt honored that they’d accepted me so.
And we all cheered when we found that we’d helped take PA for Kerry...and then we broke up, worrying about what the night would bring. I barely slept that night as everything still hung in the balance and was pleased when I awoke to find Kerry talking about making sure all votes were counted or whatever he said...I must say I was stunned and terribly disappointed when I heard on the radio while on the bus back to NYC that Kerry had conceded. I couldn’t believe it. It was over. I could barely muster the strength to get up off the bus. As I walked across town to work, I listened to, I think it was Paul Krugman, being interviewed on AAR. He was saying that he hoped that all of these people who had banded together, all of these groups which had worked to help defeat Bush, wouldn’t just disband. He said this just meant that it would be that much harder to pull ourselves out of the mess Bush was getting us into. And I felt just a little bit better...There were good people on my side, good people who I could stand with even in the darkest times.
One year ago, right before the election, I felt hopeful. And now, here we are, 2000 dead in Iraq and Lord only knows what Bush is planning to take the focus off the news of indictments and such....and things look so bleak. Yes, I hope we are on the eve of many indictments and that we will take back Congress in the 2006 elections and maybe even start impeachment procedures then...but, really, how many do we have to impeach before we get to someone who’s at least not completely evil? One after another, in succession, they are all just so bad for this country. Even on Fitzmas Eve, I can’t help but feel a certain amount of despair.
Whatever our differences, I’m just glad to have so many good people standing with me, trying to get through this and dig us out of this mess as best we can. Thanks....
And to the Republican operatives among us...you’re a bit more transparent than you think. ;)
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
