Red Cedar

there are so few quiet moments in a convention – so few times where there is no one else around….. so few times when we are sober of socializing or of drink (for every convention recess starts a new bout of drinking and politics off the floor)….. i forget everytime what these events are like for me, a person easily caught up in the excitement and plans of others…. and also a person desiring of my own objectives and goals in the process.

so tomorrow is the election where i will be running and given some of the conversations i have been having, i think there is a good chance for me to win my seat at the regional council. i apparently have a reputation that has preceded me here – from the 2004 strike – and influential people on my side (surprising to me since i’m not exactly known for keeping the peace in organizing circles).

it’s always at this point in the no-sleeping-meeting-drinking cycle of political organizing i start to feel a little bit manic…. so current judgement of my chances may be way off… but i haven’t done anything outrageously anti-social yet — and i’ve had nothing but positive support since arriving at the hotel thursday night (and at coffee this morning i was offered the local presidency of another worksite should my job role change…. strangely enough). i think – for good or bad – even as an out-radical in a very conservative environment – i am memorable to people and that usually works in my favour.

it was odd today – looking over the ndp-candidates list in a morning meeting… i recognized three people on it from my student organizing days. it seems ironic in the small labour movement bc really is – we might eventually sit at the same organizing tables again, but in a very different context. i think of all of us, i might be the only one with most of my political ethics still intact – simply because it’s easier as a shop-floor union activist to be honest to one’s true feelings. if i move up the union-political ladder, the ability to say that will become increasingly more difficult which is why i have always maintained i couldn’t see myself in such a role.

but in this context, where i am courted and advanced, where every psychological need for attention and conflict is simultaneously being addressed – the idea of running higher and higher seems that much more plausible. i’m sure, no matter what happens tomorrow, after about 24-hours i will come back down to earth, once again released to my quiet home on the sunshine coast, needing a couple days of sleep to wind myself back into my own body and just ground out.