Invisible

Where is the campaign? Where are the standouts, the yard signs, the placards in the windows? Here we are, the end of the September, and the forest of political messaging that's usually all around is, well, not visible. The campaign isn't on our street, that's for sure. If it isn't here, then where? Perhaps my candidate figures this neighborhood is locked up but she, of all people, must distrust that proposition.

In the square at the Farmer's Market this morning, my politically active buddies were touting an AG candidate and urging no votes on casinos in Massachusetts. For governor, 'Well, we don't want... but we're not excited about..., still at the end of the day, anyone but...'

So I traveled to the new train station on the Orange line to visit the headquarters near Assembly Square. Inside, a typical campaign space, tables with stacks of paper, people on phones, a training classroom of volunteers, young men and women criss-crossing the space. Lights on but no electricity.

Oh, candidate, I'm a partisan and yet still you are indistinct for me. No driving force of personality has driven you out of the conceptual and into my flesh and blood face. I want to be passionate about supporting you, so make me excited about who you are. All the good things I've heard (and bad things) don't yet cohere into a You.

Well, perhaps we have to learn to love: the 'I do' before the 'will you?' Heading back to my car from the train station, a sheaf of placards under my arm, a black guy called out 'Can I have one of those? I want to put it in my window.' As I passed him one, he said, 'That other guy will set us back so far...' That man's face and intensity is vivid to me. Until yours is, oh candidate, his will have to do.