We hit a record high temperature for the day yesterday -- 90 degrees -- with somewhere around one gagillion percent humidity. It was one of those ridiculously hot, humid days we usually get in July or August, not June.
But despite the heat, over 100 volunteers in Manhattan joined a nationwide VOTE 2010 kickoff yesterday by participating in a big voter registration drive. "Fired Up" took on a whole new meaning as volunteers spread out across the steamy city to register voters and talk about the upcoming elections.
We began our day New York style with a light brunch of bagels and cream cheese.
Our staging location was the cafeteria of a Greenwich Village public school. A few dozen volunteers arrived early to help set up the room, prepare packets and sign-in and greet people as they arrived.
OFA-NY Deputy Field Director Geoff Berman gave our captains a thorough training to prepare them for questions and problems the volunteers on their teams might have.
We once again used the electronic sign-in system developed by one of our volunteers. It simplifies things tremendously to have people register into an online form that goes directly to a database. If any organizers out there want to know more about how this works, email me and I'll put you in touch with our electronic sign-in guru.
We set up a table for each of the 12 teams, and allowed people some time to get to know each other and exchange information.
Next the volunteers got an overview of the work they'd be doing -- registering voters, collecting "pledge" cards and signing up new volunteers -- and why it is important.
One of my favorite people -- the awesome and beautiful Sara -- gave an inspirational and heart-felt speech. She said that she's not happy about where we are with a lot of issues, but that this shows that we need to work all that much harder to get important things done. Sara was one of the rock stars of the NYC Obama grassroots when she was still a student in 2007 and 2008.
The teams then went off for a few hours of very hot, very sticky voter registration.
One volunteer registered a voter on the subway en route to her team's registration location.
Here are a couple of bonus photos from the voter registration event in Brooklyn.
The Manhattan people returned to the school later in the afternoon and my organizing partner Anne and I tallied the results of the days' work.
Mindoca's team won the prize for the most registrations + pledge cards + volunteer signups, earning each team member a certificate and tshirt. We also gave a framed Obama photo to the individual who registered the most voters.
But the prizes weren't the point, really, as Jackie's story illustrates.
Jackie had volunteered to be our "stage manager" yesterday morning -- to help us get set up and to oversee the signing-in of volunteers. She had another event to attend in the afternoon, but was happy to give us a few hours before her other commitment.
At the end of the day she came up to me to say that by the time the teams were preparing to leave to start canvassing, she felt so inspired by and connected to her fellow volunteers that she felt compelled to cancel her afternoon plans and join them.
She told me how glad she was that she had. She said she had great conversations with people on the street and had a wonderful time working with the other volunteers. She felt really connected to her NY neighbors and to her team members, and couldn't say enough about how grateful she was for the experience.
The volunteers who came out yesterday and so many days before to work for change are an inspiration to me. I can't say enough about how wonderful these people are, giving their time and expecting nothing in return.
But as Jackie realized, and as I have noted so many times, we do get something for our efforts -- a connection with the people around us and a deep feeling of satisfaction that we are doing something that can make a difference.