The shock of campaigning is quite jarring on my system. I've developed some coping mechanisms to deal with insomnia. For instance, I usually drink fat-free milk, but fat-free milk just does not do the trick when I drink warm milk as a home remedy for insomnia. Lately, I've started drinking 2% and, let me tell you it doesn't last long.
Last week, I raised $3,080 for my campaign. Not bad for an hour's worth of phone calls. Frankly, I should have spent several hours this week making phone calls. Did I? No. Instead, I worked on my questionnaires for the Sierra Club and realtor's association and labor, the local party-affiliated endorsement groups. One aspect of the parade of candidates is the endorsement interview. Candidates answer questions and are interviewed by groups. All this bunches up around the two weeks or so after filing closes. Now the requests are pouring in, except for the groups that tell me they already endorsed my opponent.
I have spent hours upon hours investigating city policy, city council actions, advocacy group position papers, poll results and newspaper reports for a wide range of issues. (Even if I don't win, I will be one well-informed voter.) I even threw in a get-acquainted meeting with the editor of the local newspaper. We chatted for an hour or so, strictly off the record. I'm sure I will miss that informality in the coming months. However, I feel I left her with a good impression, even though she told me her paper's reporting has to "remain balanced.'
The reason I made the money calls I did was that I needed to describe how much money I've raised. I should also have made endorsement calls, too.
I took pictures for my mailer.
To cap off another week of campaign craziness, I had my first face-off with my opponent for political action committee endorsement. According to everything I've read, PACs tend to favor incumbents. This particular PAC is stacked against me. One of the movers and shakers has contributed lots of in-kind donations (thousands of dollars) to my opponent. It would take 5 out of 7 votes for the PAC to endorse me. Also, the one person on the PAC I know would have put in a good word for me was conspicuously absent. After I got home, I wondered aloud to some friends and supporters over the phone if my opponent's lackeys had tied him up and stuck him in a closet somewhere. Simple addition and subtraction give me pretty much a the same chances that Howard Stern has to be named the world's next Roman Catholic Pope.
When I got home after the meeting, I was so shocky that I left my briefcase, my purse and my keys on the front doorstep. Fortunately, I missed these things after only half an hour or so and they were all still there when I went looking for them. The next item on my agenda was to edit and send in my next questionnaire for my next interview next week. Today, I received two more questionnaires AND a call from a powerful PAC member who set up a phone meeting with me for money. I would put the odds at 99% or more that he wants to tell me they already endorsed my opponent and do I really want to waste everyone's time by going through the interview process. The answer will be "yes" because I'm masochistic and because I want people to know who I am.
If this sounds like a grind, it is.
On the plus side, some fun things happen, too. I went to the downtown area to take pictures of me talking with business owners and shoppers. I ran into half a dozen people I know, and asked some of them to be in my brochure photos. They agreed and invited me to walk around their neighborhoods so they could introduce me to people.
If only the questionnaires could end, I could walk with friends, call about endorsements, call to ask for money and so on and on.
My list of things to do is so long, I don't even bother keeping a list anymore. I'm learning the art of strategic list making. For instance, each night, I should make a database of people to call. I should spend a minimum of three hours on the phone each day. Alas, I have job. So calls are a problem. Too bad I can't call people after midnight. I went to bed an hour ago, but I kept running through today's futile little exercise in interviewing.
The gist of these ruminations are that I answered some questions better than my opponent and I totally choked on others (I have a chance this week to recover credibility somewhat, so I fantasize about that). I turned in my fair campaign practices pledge well ahead of time, but we all had to wait while my opponent filled his out. We each made little digs at each other (but things were very civil over all). I expressed my concern about the potential bias on the PAC committee (they assured me the group accounts for such bias when making decisions as a group -- yeah, right). I handed out my brochures and shook everyone's hand.
My opponent seemed giddy as we left, like I was such a lightweight he thinks he can breeze into office for a second term. He told me, as we stood on the nearest street corner in the bright California midday sun, that there are plaques in my town of all the mayors for the past 70 years (or maybe he said 30) and that he doesn't know any of them before the 9 years he's been involved. So, he said we should keep things in perspective because no matter who wins, no one will remember us in 10 years. He told me some of his precinct walking horror stories (a favorite topic among candidates, sort of like talking about the weather, not controversial). Frankly, I've heard worse. His was that he almost got bit by a dog once. I've heard of other people who have had guns pointed at them, or who show up a door at the exact moment a violent domestic dispute breaks out.
And thusly run my thoughts.
Well, maybe it's best if I warm up my milk, drink it and try to get some sleep.
