You guys, I failed.
She was actually doing the work. It took me by surprise. She was at the door. She wanted us to vote for her. She seemed a perfectly nice person.
She was the candidate with surprisingly large amounts of outside money behind her for such a small-potatoes race but won’t say who provided it. She was the one who wants to reward developers over all other considerations. She was the one who was running on what she said was terrible treatment by the city for her own project while the members of the council and planning commission openly told reporters the paperwork was not in order and the rules weren’t followed and they were ignored when they tried to get them to do it right. Forms and rules and inspections are a thing.
I made a carefully conciliatory comment in an anonymous online forum about the logical outcome of a proposal of hers, offering details based on lived experience–because I wanted my fellow voters not to have to go through what we’d gone through re rushed inspections.
She didn’t say anything like, Oh, that’s good to know, or, I’ll have to consider that; she attacked me and justified it on the claim that I was a member of the union.
I was speechless (though she had no way to know). I have no problem with unions, but I myself have never been in one. Clearly there was no point in engaging.
But a member of the city council felt strongly enough about it to say, basically, This is what she does. This is what we’ve been dealing with when she was on one of the committees.
Ohmygosh haven’t we had enough of that…
And here she was in person, smiling sweetly and asking for our vote, and I found myself unable to be my best self back. I wasn’t about to give away who I was re her attack. I wasn’t frowning. I was just waiting for her to be done.
She seemed to know she wasn’t winning us over. I simply said, I’ve already voted.
She looked over to Richard. He gave no response.
Tell her thank you, I thought, she’s canvassing, she’s doing the footwork of democracy even if you disagree with her, at least make her day pleasant.
I gave her a nod of acknowledgment as she turned to go. It wasn’t quite a smile but having not pre-considered what I would do if…, it was the best I could manage on the spur of the unexpected moment.
And yet. We were courteous. And I was online, too.
She could learn from that.