I went to Plymouth, PA to knock on doors for Obama on Saturday. Aside from the unbelievable level of volunteerism supporting Obama - this call from Jon Carson talks about one million knocks on Sunday in Pennsylvania alone - it was more sobering than uplifting. Why does our electorate vote in such low numbers? Perhaps because to some, it really is abstract. Door after door brought such a range of response - and these were targeted knocks, by the way. One guy said "Oh yeah, we're voting for Obama. We're middle class, we're poor!". But streets were empty, the factory was shuttered, and the town seemed quiet, as if there was nothing left to say or do, except wait without expectation. And living without hope is just a way of waiting to die.
There were lots of dogs and halloween decorations - evidence of families, community, people - but at the same time, the weight of this crushing and crashing economy felt massive. As did the weight of our own personal narratives. One guy that I spoke with was living in a flea-infested shack at the end of a street. He'd been paying child support for the last eight years, his house was literally falling apart, and he just seemed lost. He said to me this is all bullshit. All politicians make your life worse.
And I knew for him, he was probably right. He wasn't going to vote. Another couple, I knocked on the door, and they were elderly. She was taking care of him. He was in his underwear, watching TV. She barely looked at me, just said, we're not registered.
At this level of life struggle, with things this immediately painful, perhaps presidential electoral politics really is too abstract. Just check on the website? No way. Not even close.
And you have to wonder - can five million new green jobs get some help to Plymouth? In the end, we all have to write our own stories, but when everything seems stacked against you, nothing seems like the way home. Let's hope Obama's election really does shift the eyeline of towns like Plymouth to a more promising future.
