Saving Graces - Elizabeth Edwards [140]
Not every event was a success. John had visited the Page Belting Company in New Hampshire during the primaries, and his visit was what one political commentator called “A Moment”—people shouting out, “You understand us. I’ve been waiting for someone like you.” All magic. Campaigns being imperfect, we tried what Hollywood tries all the time, the sequel. During the general election I was doing Page Belting 3 or maybe even Page Belting 4, and the topic was to be health insurance. Here was the problem: Mark Coen, the president of Page Belting, made sure his employees had good health insurance. I was talking to a well-covered, well-satisfied audience who had no questions on health care for me. Sylvia Larson, a state senator who was wonderfully supportive during the general election and who appeared with me at every New Hampshire event, just shrugged.
I made another group of friends who also appeared with me at many events: the Military Moms with a Mission. I first met Lisa at a panel discussion in Pensacola, Florida. Her husband, like my father and grandfather, was a naval aviator, and when she spoke so eloquently about her disappointment with the way the military was treating her family and others, I knew she should be included in the Military Moms tour that was starting. At least twenty-five years my junior and with the long, straight hair of a college girl like my daughter, she would have been one of my closest friends if she lived next door. Gentle, polite Lara, well-spoken Pat, angry and inspiring Nita—our converted Republican—and Maura, full of enough life to motivate the rest of us, filled out the troop. We kept coming together, then splitting apart, coming together, then splitting. Youngstown, Ohio, Morgantown, West Virginia, Laconia, New Hampshire. Nita came to Philadelphia to be in the crowd for one of my events. What I remember most of these women—who were from all parts of the country, from all sorts of lives—is that though their only connection was that they were mothers and wives of men in the military, that was enough to transcend their differences. They were united in a cause, and they had obvious affection for one another. I honestly hated it when they piled into their van headed to the next event without me, laughing and waving goodbye.
There is a familial culture in campaigning, the sense that you can argue among yourselves but no one outside can say anything bad about my brother, my sister, my friend. It was the collective sense of being a part of something, the shared experience of bad food, no sleep, and, for months at a time, the same history. It is easiest to see with the traveling crew. Think about this. You know everything about this person. You know when they’re sick. You know when they’re tired. You know how they’re feeling. You’ve been there with ups and downs. You eat every meal with them. You spend every hour of the day with them. You’re on the plane flying back and forth across the country, sitting there playing Boggle, singing, laughing, and running through the earlier events. When Ryan’s pants ripped, Hargrave and I each offered to sew them for him. We were mothers, and we didn’t stop because we were a candidate’s spouse and her companion.
I know it happens at the staff level, and I have seen the affection these people who meet and work together, campaign after campaign, develop for one another. I am certain it happens in Republican campaigns, just as I saw it happen in Democratic campaigns.