My arthritic, 50-year-old knees ache.
My left achilles tendon is throbbing. (Why just the left? I have no idea. Could this be a karma thing?)
My back aches. My feet hurt. I'm at that point of "tired" where I don't even want to get up from the chair and go up the steps to bed.
Man, this feels good!!!
No, I am not a masochist. I'm an activist.
For the past four weeks, I have been walking neighborhoods, knocking on doors; phone banking; working booths, or the crowd, at public events; attending strategy meetings; writing sound bites and press releases; MCing candidate rallies and icing down beer and soda and bottled water for my fellow volunteers and progressive candidates.
I have been up to my ears in trying to get good people elected here in Kansas, to the state legislature and the state board of education (yes, the home of the yahoos who have been trying to eliminate evolution from our science curriculum).
I spent the first 20-some years of my life avoiding political activity. I was a journalist, and fiercely proud of my independence and disinterest. And rightly so.
But then I left the profession, and discovered an opportunity for activism, advocacy and action on behalf of the people and causes I believed in. It has been exciting, invigorating, and rewarding in so many ways.
I joined an organization committed to promoting excellent and equal education for all children. It appealed to me, because I believed then, and believe now, that a system of free, universal, equal and excellent public education is the foundation of both democracy and the betterment of the human condition. It is a cause I will fight for all the days of my life.
In that time, I have found myself doing things I never dreamed I would do. I got up, walked to the microphone and spoke up at local and state school board meetings. I testified before state legislative committees. I walked a protest line in 13-below-zero weather. I led rallies where I introduced Gov. Kathleen Sebelius and other dedicated public servants. I even wrote part of an amicus brief for a state supreme court appeal of an education funding lawsuit.
Yes, I get tired. And sore. And, at times, dispirited. We lost a key court case just last week. I have seen candidates our organization fought hard to get elected lose their re-election bids when national conservative organizations poured piles of out-of-state money into campaigns.
But in just two days, I will stand among my friends and acquaintances and allies and watch the election returns come in, and know that, win or lose, I gave everything I had for what I believed in. Not that losing won't hurt. But at least I won't have these two words ringing in my ears:
"If only ..."
Kossacks, reading and writing diaries and comments is great. Never stop doing that. But never think that's enough. Turn off the computer, walk outside and get into the fight. That's where you really feel it, breathe it, live it. It will make you more alive than you ever thought you could be.
Go for it.