McDonnell for Governor

So I’ve been officially part of Bob McDonnell’s team for almost  month now, walking around neighborhoods, clipboard in hand, knocking on specified doors and giving political literature and 5-question surveys. When I signed up, it was just a part-time job opp for me, attractive only for financial purposes (however, to my credit, I did make sure to look on Bob’s site first to make sure that I’m cool with what he’s all about).

But it’s turned into a good experience.

First of all, it’s nothing like being on a mission, in several ways. For one thing, I never did half that much walking on my mission! I mean, I’m only walking for 3, 3 1/2 hours a day 4 days a week, which I know is way under what a lot of missionaries do, but in Chicago we had bikes and buses and cars and trains. Another significant difference is the being alone part. It’s just me this time–no hermana by my side. I don’t mind it either way; I loved having a companion all the time, and I like walking alone as well. Luckily I’m usually in pretty safe, middle-class suburban neighborhoods.

I think the greatest difference from missionary work is the difference in motives and the consequent lack of emotional connection. Missionary work definitely is much more intense and emotionally involved. Every door has a person behind it that you hope with all your heart is going to say yes and let you in and be excited the same way you are about what you’re sharing. You know the message is true and that’s what motivates you–the message of Heavenly Father’s love for everyone and his plan for all his children to be happy and return to him. You’re overjoyed when people accept, and devastated when they reject.

But this job is different. We’re given a list of addresses to go to–60, 80, maybe 100–and our goal is to get to all of them as quickly as possible with as many surveys as possible, hopefully before the sun’s down (and it’s definitely going down sooner nowadays!). I’m glad when people don’t answer or refuse the survey, because that helps me finish all the more quickly, meaning I get to go home to Jacob sooner.

So that’s basically how it goes.

Most people I’ve come across are for McDonnell, so they’re pretty good-natured. But I’ve had some pretty entertaining encounters. One guy who was a democrat opened the door and as soon as I introduced myself, he started yelling adamantly, “I hate Republicans!!! I can’t talk to Republicans!! If there’s a Republican around, I just can’t talk to him, I’m sorry!! This whole neighborhood is full of’em!! I’m sorry, but I just can’t stand Republicans!!” I didn’t feel threatened at all, because strangely enough, he was yelling nicely and smilingly. After he shut the door I just kind of laughed to myself and moved on.

The weather sometimes makes things interesting. The most interesting weather day was Monday. I started out at 4 as usual, and it was mostly sunny, kind of cool. About an hour or so later I came to a Hispanic family’s house, where a van was stopped in front with a couple of people who I thought lived there, but it turns out they were just the pastry sellers–the back of the van was full of Mexican pastries. The guy offered me a free concha, which I of course was glad to accept. Then by the time I went in the house and finished giving the survey, it had started pouring outside! I was in a bit of a puddle because I had all this stuff to carry through the rain: my clipboard with the address papers, the brochures, plus the concha I’d been given. The lady of the house offered me a plastic garbage bag to cover me, so once I accommodated myself–clipboard and papers cradled in one arm with the concha on top, and plastic bag in the other hand and draped over everything, including my head–I set off running out into the torrential rain back to the car.

But when I was running through the rain the concha kept sliding everywhere and the brochures kept slipping and the bag kept fluttering and falling and not really doing its job and finally a lady pulled up in a blue van and said, Do you need help getting somewhere? But luckily my car was just ahead so I ran up to it, opened the door, and let everything tumble into the car (which is why there is still concha frosting streaked across the passengers seat).

LUCKILY I had an umbrella in the car, so I drove to the next street and prepared myself to go out in the rain again, which was another ordeal in and of itself. I’ll spare you the details, but basically by the end, after I’d gotten out of the car once, struggling to get the umbrella to open, and then returned for a jacket since it had pockets to carry some stuff, I was finally all ready and equipped to go. I got out and was going along for about ten minutes, and then it stopped raining. For the rest of the afternoon.

I haven’t had any rain troubles since then, but I still keep the umbrella and jacket in the car.