Leaves
tumbled. They sounded crisp and crunched at my heels. Harvest moons
threatened my path, approaching the storied house on my appointed
round, my first literature drop. I'd seen many before, legs at shoes
of family, friends and foes. Some were the DFL associates, the loyals
who long ago threw their time to have a measured shot at stopping
Lyndon Johnson in his tracks and bringing a decisive end to the
Vietnam War. My role models had been “clean for Gene” McCarthy,
the Minnesota Senator who upset the favorites.
A
house in back of ours, on Aldrich Avenue, was rumored to be haunted.
It was down the block and behind our neighbors a few doors down. One
walked to a typical rambler with a normal smiling suburban housewife
answering the door, and went though the house into the backyard.
Within yards, a warp was sustained, an altering of dimension and
security—perhaps reality. Windows were always filled with cobwebs
in the frames, the wood partitions that played tricks on young eyes.
It was called the tree-house and stories of mental instability were
known to have circled the neighborhood. The from of the house, facing
Lyndale Avenue, had a dirt yard that suddenly grew into a great
unkempt lawn. In the middle was a tall old oak tree. Its roots
rumbled through the grounds like thick muscles of sanity. They were
mossed and buried in many season's leaves. From the street tall grass
hid the rue nature of the house, the lure of eccentric appeal it
could have to a kid.
My
first candidates were likely the local and state people. They were
Don Fraser and Wendell Anderson. They were Joan Growe and Warren
Spannus. They were people who I might someday see face o face. State
legislators like Shirley Hokanson were talked about a lot around my
house, and it is likely I campaigned for her. I went though our first
neighborhood, though, with innocence, with a curiosity to do what I'd
seen my folks do. I was four or five and bundles of DFL literature
were delivered to our house. It was as though everyone at the top
knew the bottom, the grassroots, and Barbara Amram knew things grew
from the bottom up—not the top down. That was the DFL way, it was
the mainstay of our fray. It was known that, as 3rd
district chairwoman, Amram would get the word out, either by phone or
in print.
When
I stood on my own two feet, before I crawled, I wanted to help get
the DFL message out. I guess I was tired of just watching and
listening,learning and guessing which way the answers waved. I got in
the act. My small packet of literature was parceled out to me,
thoughtfully ladled like a bowl of soup from a pot bubbling with
urgency, simmering with glues to one day yield a better society. I
had my blocks, my quotas, which included that house of my design. I
began at the next-door-neighbor and worked my way to more difficult
territory. I advanced, door by politely listening door, to the
lesser-known hermit houses, the curmudgeons who were most likely not
planning to vote. I thought they still ought to know what's out
there. They should in a democracy, even if they chose not to
exercise their vote, have the opportunity to know how good their life
could be.
I
took my time, I skipped to houses, I dropped my materials between
outer and inner-doors. Those were the air traps that I lifted,
dropped literature to the bottom, and gently pushed shut. Some had a
glass pane, some did not. Often I really hoped no one heard me, and I
just ran away as though I'd left a flaming sack for them to see. By
the end of my round my supply was getting low. I made sure I had
enough for the tree-house. I felt, if anyone should know the
candidates they should. This family of suburban dwellers on the
fringe of status quo, this misunderstood mystery house was curious to
me. Around its oak tree was a house, with ghosts or blanketed
occupants, and any séance in my old neighborhood in Richfield most
likely got its spirit power from it.
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