When It Hits Home

Learning That It's Not A Vote, It's A Person
10/20/06

As of this date I have knocked on over 4000 doors during the course of this campaign. I probably have 1000 more to knock on before it is over. Thirty five hundred of those doors have been since September 10th but out of all the doors I have knocked on none was as important as the door I now stood in front of.

I was in Elk City, Kansas standing in front of a non-descript small white house located on a non-descript worn asphalt street. The sky was gray and like a mirror reflected the mood of the day. A chill wind rustled the leaves in a partial pile in the yard by which a rake laid. A shiver ran through me because I knew why the task had not been completed. I reached down and picked up the rake, leaning it against the house. I approached the door and prepared to knock.

As I have traveled District 12 which encompasses the northwest corner of Montgomery county, eastern Chautauqua county and all of Elk county I have met all types of people and have found myself lending assistance where I could. When I started my campaign for the Kansas House of Representatives I knew that I would be visiting a lot of homes but I had no idea how involved I would become with the people that I met. In my naïveté I thought that door knocking meant going door to door and asking people to vote for you. It goes way beyond that and it might just be the ultimate human to human experience an individual may have.

Sometimes you deal with the amusing. Like the door in Longton, Kansas that was answered by a very attractive young lady. As I delivered my spiel; “Hello, my name is Jim George and I am running for the Kansas House of Representatives.” At this point I always hand my campaign brochure to the person and finish up with; “I am in your neighborhood today to introduce myself and to ask that you remember me in November.” The person at this point will usually either acknowledge the contact and we say our goodbyes or they engage me in further discourse about the campaign and issues. On this day it was to take an unexpected turn.

As I finished the first part of my spiel and handed the young lady the brochure I became aware that she was wearing a very short t-shirt and nothing else! As the realization hit me that this lady was naked from the waist down the second part of my monolog fell out of my mouth like this; “I, um, ah, am, um, in your, um, yeah, um, asking you to , ah, remember, um me in, ah, November.” She smiled a sly smile, chuckled and taking the brochure assured me that she would indeed remember me. As I walked away I said, “Nice shock value!” She laughed and closed her door. It is not often that I am left speechless.

Another amusing event happened in Howard, Kansas. As I knocked on a door a white minivan pulled into the shared drive of the house next door. Getting no answer to my knock I left a brochure in the screen and headed for the van. Inside the van was a lady in her mid thirties checking off boxes on a chart in the notebook she had rested on the steering wheel. As I approached she looked up and rolled down her window. I launched into my script smiling my best smile and holding out my brochure. She looked down her nose at the harvest gold piece of paper in my hand but made no attempt to take it from me. She cut me off stating, “I’m a Jehovah Witness and we don’t get involved in politics.” I thanked her and apologized for the intrusion. As I turned to walk away she asked me if I would like a copy of the JW magazine, Watchtower. Waving my hand I said, “No thanks, I’m a politician and we don’t get involved with Jehovah Witnesses.”

From the amusing to the not so amusing you never know what the next door knock may bring. While I was in Howard I ran into a gentleman who has cogitative heart disease. He does not qualify for Medicaid nor can he collect social security benefits even though he is ill and sixty years of age. The reason why is because he owns his own small business. He cannot afford health insurance so without Medicaid he is between a rock and a hard place. He is in effect being penalized for living the American dream. He wants to transfer his business to his son but the Kansas Economic Development Commission determined that the sons credit wasn’t good enough to warrant a development grant.

I suggested that the gentleman contact the Kansas Small Business Administration for transfer of the assets and company assistance, contact a Social Security Lawyer to fight for his benefits and establish a Limited Liability Company under his sons name for the transfer of the company on paper. I found the contact info for SBA and got it into his hands. The gentleman was grateful for the advice. I just hope he gets the help he needs.

Some people you do not, at first anyway, meet face to face. Your initial contact may be through a telephone wire. So it was that I first encountered a lady with degenerative lung disease from Granola, Kansas. I was working in my studio when I received her call. Through her tears and breathless sentences I was able to unravel her story. She and her adult son shared the same residence and neither were in any shape to work. She not only suffered from her lung disease but her son had recently been diagnosed with a severe psychological nervous disorder that prevented his return to the carpentry work he was skilled at let alone any other kind of labor. The lady and her son survived off of her Social Security check and thirty dollars a month in food stamps. Social Security had turned down her sons claim and they were waiting for the claim to be heard before an appeals judge. The situation was made worse by Medicare Plan D which was now taking fifty dollars of her benefits check to co-pay for medication she once did not have to lay out cash on. When your income is $600.00 a month to support two people you can ill afford to lose even one penny.

She had pleaded with a social worker from the Kansas Department of Human Resources (SSR) but was told that because her son hadn’t been declared disabled by Social Security her food stamp amount could not be increased. The lady had called her Representative’s office (the same office I am running for) and they had hung up on her saying there was nothing they could do for her. She was at her wit’s end and did not know where to turn. She had remembered reading my name in a newspaper, she took a chance and gave me a call.

After we had talked and she told me her story I told her that I would see what I could do but that I could not promise anything. As soon as I hung up I called the local office of SSR and got the number for the appeals board. I talked with a representative from investigations and demanded that her case be looked into. Next I phoned the office of Senator Derrick Schmidt and told them they had a constituent who needed immediate help. I then called the Elk County Clerk and instructed her to get a permanent advance voting application to the lady. She wanted to exercise her right to vote but could no longer get to the polls.

On October 2nd I had an opportunity to meet the lady and her son in person when I was in Granola door knocking. I found out that the lady had received a call from Senator Schmidt’s office asking for more details. Within a couple of days a social worker visited her home as well as the Elk County Clerk. The ladies daughter now lives with them as a caregiver and is receiving reimbursement for the service. Their food stamp allotment has been increased and the lady and her son now have permanent advance voting rights. They are still waiting for the hearing before the appeal judge but at this point their lot is a little easier.

There are so many people with so many stories and none of them are small. From the “MySpace.Com” friend who wrote me trying to find out how to get an advance voting ballot to the lady who shared her faith filled story about her son who suffers from cystic fibrosis each story is equally important as are the people whose stories they are.

Sometimes I make my contacts at forums, luncheons or events that I attend So it was that I met the Campbell’s at a Seniors Luncheon in Elk City on October 13th. I sat next to Gerald and Joyce Campbell at the luncheon and afterwards took a campaign yard sign to their home. When giving me directions to their home Mr. Campbell had joked that it was the house that only had half the windows covered with plastic in preparation for the soon to be colder weather. By the morning of October 14th Mr. Campbell was dead!

Which is why I was getting ready to knock on the Campbell’s front door. Two days before I had received a note in the mail from another Elk City resident, Mary Ann Hogan, telling me of Gerald Campbell’s passing. I knocked on the door and waited not quite sure what I was going to say to this lady I had only briefly met a few days before. As it turned out that was not going to be a concern.

As Mrs. Campbell opened her door I smiled and handed her the sympathy card that I had brought from my wife and I. Joyce Campbell looked older than her 70 odd years and the weight of her grief hung on her shoulders like an oak oxen yoke. Her moist eyes searched my face as I said, “Mrs. Campbell I am so sorry to hear of your loss.” She forced a smile and said in her thick Scottish accent, “I can’t speak of him right now, he’s gone.” I placed my right hand on her left shoulder. The pink knit sweater felt foreign in it’s softness on this chill day. “Mrs. Campbell, if there is anything at all I can do for you….” I indicated the unfinished yard work with a sweep of my arm. “Thank you,” she said, “my son will be here tomorrow.”

I was struggling for the next words of comfort to offer when Mrs. Campbell opened up. “He did not finish his chores,” She said. I said nothing and listened. “I had a list of things for him to do and he did not finish up. How could he leave me without finishing?” She looked past me and into the yard. “He died in the alley, out back. They brought him back you know.” She looked at me, tears streaming down her face. “Why did they do that?” she asked. “They were trying to help.” I offered. “I know,” she wiped her eyes. “I know but I couldn’t stand to see him hooked up to all those tubes and wires.” Her gaze turned distant. “He told me he was halfway to heaven when they brought him back. He said he could see the light of heaven. He wanted to know why they didn’t let him go.” I gave her shoulder a small squeeze of comfort. “He was laying there then…..” She lowered her head as the weight of her loss gripped her heart.
“Mrs. Campbell,” I said, “I’m serious, if there is anything at all that I can do, please don’t hesitate to ask. My number is on the back of my brochure.” She looked at me, “His service is at the church on Saturday.” She indicated the direction with a general pointing motion. “What time?” I asked. “Ten, ten in the morning.” she answered. “I will make every effort to be there.” I assured her. She thanked me for coming and closed her door. I will rearrange my schedule and I will be there, because it is the one thing that I know Mrs. Campbell wants me to do for her.

We are inundated by the news media every election year with numbers, percentages and statistics. People and their votes are transformed into facts and figures. But people are not numbers nor percentages. They are not statistics, facts nor figures. And they are certainly not votes, they are people.

When I started my campaign I was under the impression that the point of door knocking, attending events, forums and functions was about garnering as many votes as possible. Of course these things are important to gain the votes you need because people are more likely to vote for someone that they have met. I have discovered however, that it goes deeper than that. Each vote represents a living, breathing person who has his or her own story like those few I have shared here. Each vote represents a living, breathing person whose has put their faith in you, the candidate and their hope that you will work to make their life a little better than it was.

If I walk away from this experience with no more than the memory of the people I have met and their lives that they have allowed me to be a part of for a short period, then I am truly a richer man by far than when I started this journey. For I have learned an important truth that many have forgot or may never learn; It is not about the vote, it is about the people.

"The elected official works for the people! You do not make promises to your boss which are beyond your power to keep and expect to hold your position."

-Jim George- Democratic Candidate, Kansas State House of Representatives District #12