May 6, 2008...3:32 am
We are the change that we seek
I stopped by the local Obama headquarters in downtown today. I volunteered to put yard signs around the city. They gave me the sign part but said they were out of the metal stakes. I took the signs anyway, thinking I would find some other way to put them up.
I tried with wooden dowels I bought at a mega home improvement store. I stood at the corner of a busy intersection trying to pound the sticks into the ground with a rock. I felt everyone at the red light staring at me. I managed to put up a sign but it’s not stable. I think I’ll have to go back tomorrow and figure out something else. I’m really dreading it but I will go.
Carlos hasn’t made this any easier on me. We had an argument when he found out I had volunteered. I wish he was more supportive of the things I feel passionate about. He said,
“You’re out there driving around putting up signs and not even being paid!”
I knitted my eyebrows together. “But I don’t want to be paid. I want to do it because I want to contribute. I want to be part of this. Not everything is about money.”
“You have other things you should be doing! Why don’t they do it?!”
“Who is ‘they’?”
“The other people!” he shouted, sweeping his hand through the air.
“That’s exactly the mentality that keeps things from getting done. We are the other people.”
“Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we’ve been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.” - Barack Obama
7 Comments
May 6, 2008 at 3:43 am
Amen to that!
I am a huge Obama supporter and I will be watching tomorrow’s primaries closely!
May 6, 2008 at 8:04 pm
So, my husband moonlights over at your house as “Carlos”, huh? LOL!! I can’t believe how much these two guys are. I can hear, and see my husband in place of Carlos, with the same emotions. He doesn’t understand my need to part of something bigger, to help, even if it has no other purpose and no thanks other than what I get from it. Men. Hopefully, Obama gets elected, and they can see how we knew best all along. ;)
May 7, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Good for you Tee! I totally agree…we ARE the “other” people.
I was really hoping for a clearer Obama victory last night…winning Indiana I think would finally have gotten H out of the race. Even so, he did strengthen his delegate count and that’s where the bottom line is.
May 7, 2008 at 7:06 pm
I had a dream last night that you moved next door, and you kept typing the entire time they were moving. It was irritating at the time, but hilarious when I woke up. Hope all is well.
May 7, 2008 at 10:07 pm
You are the type of person we need. I am not able to get out and volunteer right now but would love to. And I think you are supporting a great cause! ;)
Good job Tee!
May 9, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Deputyswife - *high five* :)
Humincat - I think they must be twins separated at birth. They really are a lot alike. I wonder if they ever met if they would love each other or hate each other because of that. LOL.
Tammy - I was hoping to win Indiana, too, but look at how close it was! …. And nothing, nothing, my friend, will get H to quit. LOL. I’ve come to terms with that and just trying to be pro-Obama instead of anti-H. It’s hard though.
Humincat - ROFL. It is so weird that because of the internet we dream about people we’ve never even met! - It’s happened to me, too.
Jodi - You’ve got your hands a little more than full! LOL. You are doing an important job, too and you have a beautiful heart :)
May 14, 2008 at 12:46 pm
Tee,
I might have a tiny bit of insight into Carlo’s reaction. I think that it is more of a cultural thing. Volunteerism is not common in other countries. Our director of hunger relief is from Venezuela and still marvels that that we have over 450 active volunteers, as many as twenty-five every single day preparing and delivering the food.
When ever I talk to groups of people that are visiting our country, they ask the very same question- do volunteers get paid? Of course, they are also asking why there are homeless people, why don’t their families take care of them?
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