Changing the map vs. changing your life

In 2006 I was an active part of the Perlmutter campaign. Starting before the primary, I was at Perlmutter HQ at least 10 hours a week, gradually increasing to where I was spending 30+ hours a week volunteering. (And 12+ hour days in the week before the election.) I got to know Ed and his family, got to serve as his back-up driver when the regular guy wasn't available, and became a go-to volunteer around HQ. Eventually I got paid a bit, for the last month of the campaign, but mostly I was there because I wanted to be. I believed in his candidacy and worked my butt off to get the guy elected and flip the district from (R) to (D). In most cases this has proven to be well worth my time. He's been a solid vote on almost everything (with the exception of the recent FISA debacle. I don't know what happened there.) He's also done some neat stuff with encouraging 'green' construction nationwide.

So now we're in the middle of another election cycle, if you hadn't noticed. I find myself strangely uninvolved. Thinking back it's pretty obvious why 2006 was so different. Back then I was in a crumbling relationship with my roommate and girlfriend of 5.5 years. I didn't want to be home in the evenings and time at HQ (.25 miles down the road) was time away from awkwardness. It was an escape for me, in addition to being something I believed in. For all of her political leanings, Sarah didn't want to do much to actually get a candidate elected, so that became my escape. At the time I was also working a job that required me to actually show up zero hours/week.

2 years later, I'm a husband to a wonderful woman, a step-daddy of 2, and I actually have to go to work. This leaves pretty much no time to get involved politically. People from the old campaign are asking me constantly to help phone bank or canvass...things I absolutely loved doing. I hate saying No, but at the same time my responsibilities are so much greater at home. It would be nice if I had time to be idealistic and do what I could to help get Udall and Obama elected and (I believe) create a better country and world for my kids.

It's obvious to me now why the politically involved tend to be college students and retirees. When it comes to changing the world, there's so much more immediacy and intimacy in spending time your family than in struggling to convert voters to a candidate you believe will promote policies that will eventually create a better life for said family. I haven't lost my idealism or anything, but the expression of it has certainly changed with the changes in my life.