It's unusual for me to have so much trouble putting my thoughts into words. All I can think of is that incredible thunderstorm on election day in 2004. My ten year old daughter and I had volunteered to knock on the doors of registered Democrats and remind them to vote. At every home where someone answered the door, they proudly told us they had already been out to vote for John Kerry (Kerry DID carry Orleans Parish, but the state overall went to Bush). Around noon, with my energetic, enthusiastic daughter setting a hectic pace to get to as many homes on our list as we possibly could, the sky just opened up with one of those thunderstorms we get here in subtropical south Louisiana, raining so hard we were stuck on someone's porch, unable to move on, unable to even see to the street (luckily, there was a Kerry sign in the yard and I was wearing a Kerry shirt, so I wasn't too worried about the homeowners returning and being upset to find strangers on their porch). I kept telling my daughter it was raining too hard, that we couldn't possibly go on. My daughter, however, with all the indignation and innocent insight of a ten year old, stuck her hand on her hip and said, "MOM, IF JOHN KERRY WERE HERE, HE WOULD GET OUT THERE AND KNOCK ON SOME MORE DOORS, RAIN OR NOT. IT'S IMPORTANT FOR HIM TO BE PRESIDENT, MOM. WE HAVE TO GO ON."
It's awfully hard to go on lately. My beloved city is still wrecked, family members scattered to the winds like our ancestors in the Acadian diaspora of 1755. Bush didn't even mention us in his State of the Union speech! Since Katrina, I actually had to spend a month in a partial inpatient program at the hospital for depression. And then the Saints were a fabulous, joyful distraction until Sunday night when the Chicago Bears ended our dreams of a first time visit to the Super Bowl. And then forty-eight hours after that, John Kerry announced he wouldn't be running for president this time...
John Kerry is by far the best presidential candidate of my lifetime - worldly, classy, smart, passionate, brave, thoughtful, tough yet sensitive. A decent man whose only downfall in 2004 appears to have been his unwillingness to sink to George Bush's level... I am prouder of my work for and donations to Senator Kerry than I am of anything else I've ever done in my life other than raising a fabulous kid and returning to college in my thirties. During the campaign, trying to find money to donate, my husband and I made a pact with each other - NO more spending money on lattes until Kerry is president (he was then stationed at a base in latte capital Washington State, home of Starbucks). We went back to making coffee at home in the old drip machine and set up a small monthly payment to the Kerry campaign.
I had hoped to sound as positive and reassuring as the others who have posted here, but I'm feeling awfully low right now. I DO realize Senator Kerry will go on to do great things (of course!). Still, I don't know now if he'll ever run again - or be elected - and I do know this is a huge loss for all of us, for me, and, perhaps most of all, for my daughter. As she said in those first days of September, 2005, watching from a hotel room in Little Rock as CNN showed our beloved city sinking into chaos and death by neglect, "MOMMY, DON'T YOU THINK PEOPLE IN NEW ORLEANS WOULD HAVE GOTTEN HELP QUICKER IF JOHN KERRY WERE PRESIDENT?" If only, if only, if only...
Thank you, Senator Kerry, for your hard work, your honesty, and your decency. Thanks for giving us so much hope and for being someone we can really look up to. We in New Orleans have lots of hard work ahead of us as it is and we aren't giving up, not ever; if there is anything else my husband and I can do for you and your work, we will be ready for the call.
:patriot:
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