The FTT goes door to door

(how things are going in NC)

Yesterday, while Harriet hung out with her bestie and Richard did poll observing for Democrats, Bea and I spent the day in Pittsboro and Siler City, two towns in our semi-rural county in the swing state of North Carolina.

The first stop was Pittsboro Library—our favorite, home-base library, where we saw many iterations of Snakes Alive and have long checked out dozens of books at a time. We talked about Plant Pets, decorated pots, and propagated pothos, spider plants, and night-blooming cereus. Our friend Keebe sold books, and we shared the new Plant Pets stickers we had printed, along with Mamie’s fantastic Plant Pets coloring pages, which everybody snapped up.

It was awesome to see friends old and new. Some of the visitors were tiny, like a little boy named Wren and our friend Naomi. Some were closer to Bea’s age, and some were my age. Everyone took home a plant (or two).

After that we got lunch at Sonic (Bea says this is her new favorite fast food restaurant). I do not recommend the pickle fries, but I will always love a cherry limeade. Then we made our way to the Chatham Rabbit, a cute coffee shop in Siler City’s arts district, where we met up with our Down Homies, including Ms. Young, an ESL and theater teacher at Bea’s school, and two teachers we know from Chatham County Association of Educators. They gave us cool T-shirts:

After some instructions, group photos, and cheering on by two ladies at the coffee shop, we started canvassing. We had about fifty doors to knock. If you haven’t knocked doors lately, it’s way easier than it used to be in the days of cumbersome paper records—there’s now a free app called Minivan that you use to download a list provided by your organizer (shout out to the amazing Theresa!). The app gives you the houses in walking or driving order, and feeds you a basic script, which you learn fast. One person holds the phone, and the other person holds the literature.

Right now, as Theresa told is, it’s all about getting out the vote. You’re getting people to the polls by reminding them that early voting is a great and easy option (I voted Friday), telling them where to do that, and reminding them why it is so important to vote this year. Because Minivan is giving you Democratic voters, you’re rarely walking up to a Trumpy house or even an on-the-fence house. Minivan will tell you if folks have already voted, and you can thank them for their support and see if they want to help their neighbors vote.

Mostly, we were walking in lower-income mobile home neighborhoods in Siler City. Like everybody, these folks have complicated and busy lives, with doctor’s appointments, medical issues, work, school, childcare. They’re lives that will be vastly better supported by the Democratic agenda of supporting and funding public schools, ending price gouging and unfair labor practices, bolstering Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security, and working on environmental justice and climate change. And they know that—every person we spoke to supported Kamala Harris.

Let me repeat that: Every person we spoke to—Black, white, and Latinx—supported Harris and the Dems.

Other canvassers I’ve talked to are saying the same thing. There is huge energy here in NC. Excitement. Joy, even. It’s different than 2016, different than 2020.

But we’ve got to get people to the polls. The system is so stacked against poor and working people that election day is not a national holiday. Most people don’t get that day off from work. And sure, those working people may be able to go after work or before work, and stand in a long line, but what about the elders in their families, who need rides to the polls, and need info about curbside voting?

That’s what canvassing is about—finding out where people are and what they need. Minivan has a notes section where you type in notes (this person needs help with curbside voting, this person needs a ride), and the organizers will follow up. You can do this as a door knocker, you can do this through phone or text banking like the girls’ Aunt Joy and our good friend Marsha.

You can check in on your own friends, neighbors, and associates—you voted yet? Need any help?

After our last door, Bea told me that she was thinking about entering a scholarship contest she heard about at school, but she wasn’t sure if she qualified. You need to have good grades, she said, but you also need to be active in your community. She wasn’t sure if canvassing counted, and I told her it sure did.

I also reminded her that in the spring, she helped CCAE advocate for raises for all Chatham’s teachers by speaking at the County Commissioner meeting. “That was huge community service!” I said. “Every teacher in Chatham County got a two thousand dollar raise!”

“But I didn’t do that much,” she said. “I just spoke that one time.”

I told her that with really effective group actions, nobody does “that much” on their own. It’s everybody working together, little by little, that gets big things done. Like today, maybe we canvassed fifty houses, but with our group of eight teams we probably canvassed around 400. That’s on one afternoon, in one town, with one group.

County to County, Neighbors on Call, and Down Home are all doing daily get out the vote work, from door knocking to phone banking to text banking. Nationally, you can sign up with Vote Save America or Planned Parenthood. Other folks are motivating their friends and family with calls and emails telling them why this year is so important (shout out to Uncle Alan!), posting on social media, or working as poll observers, election judges, and poll greeters.

What’s something you want to do before election day, or have seen someone else do that is making a difference? Do you have a favorite organization you work with? Shout them out in the comments!

P.S. Bea and I loved the SNL spin on Kamala’s Fox News interview from this week: