More Politics

Well last night I spent two hours working a phone bank as a Stand for Children volunteer to inform and identify 'no' votes for question 1 on the MA ballot on Nov 4th. It was an interesting couple of hours. I have phone banked once before and I'll be honest and say I don't enjoy cold calling people. In fact it is my least favorite activity that I do for Stand. Last night's phone bank however was very well organized. The script was well written and easy to follow. I called 65 phone numbers, but only made contact with 15 or so individuals. I left many messages. I only encountered a few negative individuals thankfully. The other people I spoke to were either like minded or they were individuals who did not have any understanding of the question.

One funny story from last night...I called a particular number and asked to speak to "Amy Smith". The young man who answered the phone gave a business name and said that he was a "Smith" but their was no "Amy Smith". He was pleasant and I apologized for taking up his time. So maybe 8 phone numbers later I ended up dialing a number looking for "Suzy Smith". Don't you know it is the same man on the other end of the phone from the same company. He recognized my voice and asked "Didn't you just call a few minutes ago?" I apologized again and commented on how strange it was to have two names connected with his number that were not related to him. So at that point I asked him if I could share some information with him about question 1 and did he know anything about the question. He said he didn't but he was more interested in question 2( decriminalize personal possession of pot). I promptly replied that I wasn't calling about that question and went on about question 1. Anyway to make an even longer story a little bit shorter...the conversation ended with the gentleman sharing with me that prior to our conversation he didn't know about question one and that after our conversation he decided he would vote no. Then he asked if he could count on my 'yes' vote on question 2. Quite a conversation.

So after the evening of making phone calls I've decided that phone banking isn't so bad.

Peace!