I’m writing this from Virginia. I worked from this identical spot on the loveseat in the living room overlooking the water nearly two years ago, when I was here with my Mom for her final journey. Now I’m here for a very different reason – campaigning for Obama.
I arrived in Virginia late Thursday night from a business meeting in Florida. During my trip, I had the fortune of attending the Obama-Bill Clinton rally in Kissimmee, Florida. It was the first time I’d seen Obama (or Clinton, for that matter) in person. They were inspiring, but even more inspiring was the diversity and enthusiasm of the crowd. I’d never seen a more diverse group of people ever, in the US or in Canada – black, white, hispanic, asian, old, young, children – you name it, they were represented in substantial numbers. I was proud to be American and proud to be part of the group.
The Kissimmee rally was a great kickoff my several days of campaigning. I arrived in Virginia Thursday night. An old friend and her daughter, who had driven up from North Carolina, had already arrived. After too many years of not seeing each other, we talked into the wee hours of Friday morning.
On Friday, the 3 of us drove into Tappahannock and took a canvassing assignment. We found very few people home. Yesterday we asked for an assignment closer to home – Montross – and among the 3 of us did 2 assignments. Today there were 2 more. The weekend was more successful from a folks-are-home standpoint. We’ve found people that we’ve met are exceedingly enthusiastic and hopeful. It’s a joyful task, even if some of the rural addresses are, well, rather spotty. (Pictures will follow later.)
Tomorrow the job will be to blanket varous areas (the past few days were voter-specific, quite targeted). The key is to get as many folks out to vote as possible – and there are people like my friends and I all over the country doing what we can to encourage the turnout.
Tuesday will make all of this work worth it.