|
Chapter 17
The RV was looking sweet.
We hadn’t used it in a while, and after taking time to travel for
a year’s time, settled in to our little family business some years back.
We kept it and stored it through that time.
It was pretty new when we bought it, maybe a year old.
The retired couple we bought it from used it three times and sold
it due to health problems, and Margie is squeaky clean and very
particular. It was very clean
when we moved out of it from our travels, and was like a time capsule
since we left it. At this
moment with all lost in the fires I felt whole again for the moment, as we
had lived the RV life before. It was in a way like coming home. I
was so glad that Dwayne had successfully pulled it away from the fire in
time, as it felt like a real treasure and home for us at this moment.
We had lived in it about a year and work camped out of it doing
yard chores and working the office at the RV parks we visited.
This gave us a chance to see the country and work off the cost of
the RV space, 20 hours a week as a trade out was the typical offer.
It was a piece of cake for me, loving simple things like mowing and
trimming trees that needed maintenance.
I spent extra time working sometimes to get projects done that I
started, and the RV park owners and managers loved us for that.
We could visit anytime in the places we stayed before, as
generosity had built relationships and friends for us that would last as
long as the owners were still there. It
was what I called a “laptop life”.
Fold it open, and everything is there.
Fold it up, and go anywhere.
“Ready to roll honey”, Margie
asked? “Just about Marge,
let me finish stowing the plumbing, as she is all freshly flushed and
ready for the road.” The
traveling was exciting for us. We
absolutely loved it. It was
fun to travel for the scenery, especially when you didn’t have deadlines
or places you had to be. This
would be different now, as we already have a schedule started with Margie
working the phones. She was a
great campaign manager. Anything
she picked up she did well at. She
had several schools and University venues booked to start our campaign
trail. We started with our
announcement to run for the presidency very early, being the first to
formally announce our candidacy for the election.
We thought that one through too, as we figured with lack of the
twenty plus million dollars for advertising that other candidates might
have, that the extra time would help build momentum before they even
announced they would run. It
could only help, we thought. Margie
had worked everything out and had the cell phones bumped to maximum
minutes to get the best rate, as we figured it would be busy.
She also had the mail all set, and her best friend Barb would
handle all the mail and deposit anything that might come in for the
future. We were up to an
astonishing 1.7 million dollars in donations at this point, an astonishing
number that kept climbing, also creating energy between us, that feeling
of; how could we loose? This
was all unsolicited money too. We
kept track for election reporting purposes the best we could, for those
that would tell us who they were. For
the ones that did not, we deposited the money in our account as a donation
because of the fire, and then personally contributed the money to our own
campaign, “The People for Golden Simms, For President of the
United States
.” We felt confident in the
idea that if we didn’t win, we would have fun trying, as well as get the
ideas out that now both of us were working on as a platform.
Margie would write down what she could when I would take a position
on something, and create an outline for each topic, so that I would not
back track and take a different idea.
I never felt I would do that though.
I was speaking from the heart, with what I thought was an uncanny
clarity of what was right, and with all the responses and mail, not to
mention that amount of money we had already received, was pretty confident
that folks would listen and would maybe feel the same way.
Letters were over 10,000 at this point too, and these supporting
statements in the letters were also escalating our confidence. That is
more compliments than any person would receive in a lifetime, much less
over a few weeks. It didn’t
give me a big head, rather a level of confidence to use this forum that
was presented to me to get my ideas out to the people.
It was a pretty comfortable feeling for sure.
How could we loose? We
had the goal of ideas in the first place!
We didn’t set ourselves up for any failure that way, and it
showed when I spoke. All we
had was enthusiasm for success of getting our message out, which was
inevitable for our goals, a great win-win attitude that now showed on our
faces and in my voice. There
was never a concerning moment really since we made the decision to run for
office, other than our turbulent event with the fires and my concern for
Margie’s safety. I never
worried about my own safety. I
lived that way I guess, always ready for that next rapid when boating
rivers. The noisier the rapid,
the more exciting for me, not the more threatening.
She was the same way in that respect.
Our paddling also gave us analogies that helped us through life
too. We never knew what was
around the next river bend and looked at life that way.
We also knew that through a tough rapid that we might even spill
our kayaks and was indeed tough experiences sometimes, to say the least
cold and wet. It did always
look different looking back at the rapid after we got through it;
sometimes after a calculated and proper rapid swim with feet pointing
downstream and back stroking to the shore.
We always knew that point of perspective of looking back at it was
there in our future too. We
always took the time to look back at a good rapid on the river for that
very reason. It was like a
tradition to check it out together. We
knew we would live through it, for better or wetter, and looking back at
those rapids reminded us that we always came out just fine.
“OK
Margie, got everything?” She
quipped back, “Everything we own Goldie.”
We were able to start laughing at our past now, making those past
weeks a bit more bearable. It
does take a great woman to stick with you through the loss of everything,
to make you feel richer coming out the back side of the event, one really
big rapid for us. We survived
that one too. It looks like it
is time to hit the road…
|
