portland update.

i'm about to go to the dark room with pat, and find out if his bacteria glows.

sorry guys, but reed college is number one.

talk is cheap

henry paullson killed the economy.

at least, thats my best guess.

he used nearly 43% of the fund given to him and 83% of the funds available to him in a plan that has done absolutely nothing.

we are running out of options.

will there be anything left for barack obama to fix, if he even can?

Some days, I wish I believed in God.

I think that I've been avoiding this post. It is really hard for me to write about what I've done with my last 5 months.

Its meant so much to me. Never in my life had I given so much of me to something. Never in my life had I poured this much heart into a singular goal, to achieve a singular task.

And I've never, ever succeed in such a way.

I miss Lily Friedman.

I miss sitting in my office with her, our desks facing each other, as we ate breakfast (on good days) and listened to the morning regional conference calls. I miss adding dial numbers frantically, as we tried fervently to get our numbers in before the nightly state wide calls.

I miss falling asleep in South Milwaukee.

I miss making volunteer calls, I miss making persuasion calls. I miss canvassing.
I miss talking to 100s of people in a day, listening to people, engaging with people.

I miss Max, and his moodiness but mostly his resilience, Mike, and his creativity and inspiration, Deb for her consistency and wisdom, Greg for his humor, Javier for his professionalism, Kalpa for her perseverance. I miss Lee and Scott for their military commitment. I miss Vanessa for her compassion and toughness.

I miss Robert, who was and will always be there with me.

And I want to thank everyone I've met since I joined, and everyone whose touched my life directly and indirectly from Kenny Miller to Barack Obama, for showing me pragmatism.

I used to say that I looked forward to missing my first appointment, that I "couldn't wait to be 18 again." Now that I have, and that I am, I can't but see how woefully arrogant I was, to diminish the importance of every appointment, or to diminish the importance of being 18.

I cherish those nights that I stayed up till 5 working, and got up at 8, and the morning that I got up at 5 after going to bed at 3.

I want to fall back into the structure of something bigger than me.

Go time.

I'm so crazy excited about everything that I've done for the last 5 months.

I do feel satisfied, proud, and confident.

That said, we haven't accomplished anything. Not yet.

And so here's my take: Now we go forward, with all of our hearts, bodies and minds, to tackle the beast that lies before us. We've been given the tools, the opportunity, and the support.

We're out of excuses.

Let's take our time to celebrate, because it's important too, and lets fucking enjoy it.

We did this. We are the fire that fuels this movement for change. We are Progress's soldiers, the warriors for truth, and the agents of change.

I want to thank everyone of you, those that I know who read this blog. I love each and every one of you tremendously, and I cherish everything you've taught me.

You've taught me what it means devote yourself.
You've taught me what it means to challenge popular belief.
You've taught me what it means to enjoy each moment that we are given.
You've taught me to appreciate beauty, to love learning, and the value of dedication.

You've taught me so much. More than I could ever list. It has shaped me, defined (by means of removing definition) my vision. But above all else, I want to thank you for instilling in me the importance of community, and every value that is required for a community to take shape.

Thank you for challenging me to communicate, to see the world from your point of view, and to appreciate the multitude of gifts that we all bring to to the table. I will never be able to repay you for that.

But in return for all these gifts, I want to make a promise, a promise to everyone who has allowed me to join them on this journey. I promise to use what you have given to me to expand and further challenge our community. Because may I'll never be able to teach you as much as you've taught me, but I know that someone out there will.

And so after a short respite, I'm going to go Forward.

i've organized my self out of a job

and now i'm shooting myself for it.

i want something to do!!!

Dawn

So I'm listening to Fischer Spooner's "Sweetness," on the Genius play list for Daft Punk's "Digital Love", the sun is rising in the window next to my desk, and all of my volunteers so far are happy.

Its going to be a good day, folks.

Its going to be a great day.

But who's going to keep up?

So some of you may have trouble sleeping...

...but I'm about to fall asleep, quite easily and quite happily.

Granted, it will be for two hours. Irregardless of that or anything, I just want to point out that on this night, I'm going to fall asleep.

And I'm sleeping on concrete.

FYI I hope to make it to my computer sometime during the day tomorrow, and again wednesday morning, because those will be good moments of reflection.

I cried today.

Yep. I cried.

Lily started talking about the how big this election was, and first I had goosebumps shoot down my spine, the back of my neck kinda tightened up, my eyes misted and a tear fell.

It was a short cry.

Now, the thing is, I haven't cried in...forever. I've been incredibly sad, and wanted desperately to cry, but nothing happened. I've been unbelievably happy, and wanted to cry. Still nothing.

I love being able to express how I feel. I really, really do. But its only because I'm so fucking incredibly drained.

I'm just so exhausted.

I want to put my head down, sometimes.

But then, all of a sudden, a smile will cross my face,

Because we knocked on almost 1,000,000 doors this weekend.

avalanche

the grandest mountain will always fear the smallest bird.

god forbid it meet an eagle