The other day while on my way to the local grocery store I noticed a group of kids in their lates teens or early 20s all wearing identical red T shirts at the gas station across the street.\u00a0 They were out campaigning for someone- I don’t remember who.\u00a0 It made me thing of someone I haven’t thought about in years.<\/p>\n
His name is Collin.\u00a0 I met him in 2007 at a campaign event for then Presidential candidate John Edwards.\u00a0 Collin had taken a year off from college to work on the campaign – in part because he believed in Edwards, and in part because he thought it would good on his resume in the future.\u00a0 He wasn’t paid much at all- Pat and I bought him quite a few cheese and tomato pizzas when he was in town.\u00a0 Of course, after the Iowa Caucus he was off to New Hampshire and points beyond.<\/p>\n
Fast forward a couple months and John Edwards was suspending his campaign because it had come out that he had fathered a child with his videographer.\u00a0 Never a great look, but his wife was suffering from terminal cancer at the time, which made it even uglier.<\/p>\n
It’s no secret that there are a multitude of ways that politicians can ruin your life.\u00a0 \u00a0It seems the current White House resident is bound and determined to ruin the lives of 99% of the American people, but that is a discussion for another day.<\/p>\n
I didn’t keep in touch with Collin so I can’t say that his life was ruined by the actions of a selfish man who thought he was too smart to get caught.\u00a0 But he DID give up a year of his life.\u00a0 He was hundreds of miles from home, living in cheap hotels with people he just met, and barely paid enough to feed himself.\u00a0 And for what?\u00a0 I doubt his work on the campaign is going to be a bright spot on his resume as he had hoped.<\/p>\n
Maybe I’m wrong and Collin has nothing but positive memories of the experience.\u00a0 But of all the kids working for Edwards, I’m sure at least one of them regrets it.<\/p>\n
Those kids I saw at the gas station were gone by the time I was done grocery shopping.\u00a0 I hope they get everything they want from their campaigning experience.\u00a0 \u00a0I doubt Collin did.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The other day while on my way to the local grocery store I noticed a group of kids in their lates teens or early 20s all wearing identical red T shirts at the gas station across the street.\u00a0 They were out campaigning for someone- I don’t remember who.\u00a0 It made me thing of someone I haven’t thought about in years…. Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5579,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"{title}\n\n{excerpt}\n\n{url}","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_wpas_customize_per_network":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[25,22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5578","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bright-shiny-objects","category-things-that-make-you-go-huh"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t