Political Stage Mother

I was a stay-at-home mom until my youngest, Alexandra, was a junior in high school. I have to admit that I was a very good mom. June Cleaver at her best. Well, except I didn’t wear dresses every day or call my son “The Beav”.  But, I really put myself last and concentrated on doing whatever I could to make my kids have the best upbringing possible. Except that I went overboard when it came “Running for office” time. I became a political junkie.

I ran for an office in high school I had a great time making up posters. I hated the posters that just said, “Vote for Ralph” (of course, the name changes, depending on who is running). Not creative at all.  I had one put in the boys bathroom that said. “Aim high, Vote for Vickie” Ok, that’s a lie. But, I won because I was creative. I remember when my mom, who is not June Cleaver, but carries one, said to me while I was making my last poster, “I don’t want you to get your hopes too high, because you probably won’t win.”  The hell you say?  Thanks, Mom.  I shall remember that in 2010 when I write a blog about the topic.  I did win, by the way, due to my mom’s encouragement and love….

I still have my huge Rubbermaid box of all of their campaign stuff. I have their speeches and things they passed out to the kids to vote for them. It was fun. I helped them way too much though. Well, Adam didn’t mind all of the help. Alex, on the other hand, was a bit trickier. She didn’t want much of my help.

Alex was the first to run for a class office. She was in seventh grade and her cousin had signed up to run for secretary and asked Alex to sign up to run for the same office because no one else had signed up and she needed someone to run against. Well, that pissed Alex off a bit, because that meant that her cousin thought she could beat her hands-down, so she signed up, despite the fact that she had to give a 30 second speech. She did not like getting up in front of people.

Well, she made signs to put up in the hall and she didn’t want my help, even when I pointed out that printed “Vote for Alex for Secratary” on one poster. Oh, Dear God, the child is running for secretary and has “secretary” spelled wrong. Maybe the kids will find humor in that or they wouldn’t realize it, because perhaps their spelling skills sucked  too. Alex still can’t spell worth a lick.

Well, Alex gave a little speech where she had a big clock and hypnotizes the audience to vote for her, and she won. That was cool. For Alex. Not for the cousin. She wouldn’t speak to Alex for a few days. But, that meant she was able to go to the West Virginia state student council camp the next summer. She decided to run for state junior high representative. Wow. She was actually going to try this again. Well, she came home from camp as the state’s new junior high rep. I was impressed. Her speech was great. She asked the kids to stand up, and slide side to side, shake a hand, sing a little song, etc. and then said, “If I can get all of this accomplished in a minute, just think what I can do in a year.”  Seriously, isn’t that good?

Well, that entitled her to start traveling with the other officers, who were juniors in high school. She went to Stamford, Connecticut, and I think Charlotte, North Carolina that year.

Well, both kids ran for a class office every year after that. One year Adam got called into the office because he had passed out little squares of bubble wrap glued on pieces of card stock that read, “Wrap up a great year, Re-elect Adam.” Well, I thought that was a great idea when I thought of it, but I guess it wasn’t such a great idea when the kids started popping the wrap in the halls as he passed them out. The teachers ran out of their rooms and the football coach laughed and followed Adam into the office, saying he was a good boy, he didn’t mean to bring stuff in that sounded like guns popping.  That didn’t go over too well. And the year before that we made airplanes made out of sky copy paper and he wrote on each one, “Soar to New Heights, Vote for Adam”. I think those were confiscated, also.

I am great with slogans. I have even had moms call me for ideas after the kids went off to college. They always borrowed from my “Campaign box”.  I think one of the best ones I thought up was the following: I took a picture of Bruce Willis and that kid from the movie, The Sixth Sense, and put it on a poster board and then had Adam make thought bubbles coming out of their mouths. The title at the top said, “It just makes SENSE to vote for Adam.”  And out of the kids thought bubble said, “I see people voting for Adam.” I can’t remember what I had Bruce Willis saying, but it was oh so witty.

This one would have been good with the bubble wrap..just kidding..or am I?

Another thing I liked to do was cut out pictures, like the previous idea. I happened to have a whole folder of cut -out pictures of animals, (I had a picture file for student teaching. I wasn’t that weird. Well, that’s a lie. I always cut out letters and pictures to add to my file folder box.I was a weird-o.) Anywho, Adam put a picture of a bunch of otters on a poster board and wrote. “You OTTER” vote for Adam. And another one of the Count from Sesame Street, and it said, “Ah Ah Ah…..You can Count on Adam”.

Yes, I was a weird one, but a creative weird one at that. My kids were winning left and right. We would go to Walmart and just walk up and down the aisles, where ideas for hand-outs or poster or speech ideas would just jump out at me. For Example, take those paper rolls that you put pennies in. Adam used those to pass out and wrote on them. “He’s on a roll. Re-elect Adam.”

Speeches were my forte. Afterall, I had a degree in Speech Communications. I was witty and creative…and vain.  I wrote some great speeches for Adam. Alex would take the idea, tweak it into her own, and then I was banned from helping. Damnit. She was one stubborn, “I need to do this myself, Mom.”  Well, hell, that’s no fun for a stay-at-home-live-vicariously-through-your-kids-mom. Her best speech came when she ran for West Virginia state student council president. She used a Rubik’s cube. I was very, very proud of her. She had her mom’s creativity. Thank goodness. Her dad didn’t get puns. He would have made terrible posters. Like “Vote for Alex.”  At least I would have had. “Vote for Alex, she Rocks” and glue pieces of gravel on the poster. See? I JUST made that up. I ROCK too.

Well, how cool it was. Alex was state president. Adam was state secretary. Alex was senior class president. Adam was student body president. We were a political family. Except for their dad, who wanted to know why the hell we had glitter all over the kitchen table.  And on the pork chops? Ok, the kitchen table was where it all happened.  We just pushed things aside for dinner time. “Jay, relax, that’s not glitter. That’s..um…red pepper on those pork chops.”

When Adam was a senior and was student body president, he and Alex were having a friendly discussion and Adam said, “Hey, you have to listen to me, I am your boss, thinking that  he was head honcho because she was “only junior class vice-president.” Alex smiled and replied, “Actually,I am YOUR boss. I am also the state president over ALL student body presidents.” Alex was able to fly to Las Vegas that year to represent West Virginia at the National convention. They both went every year. I think that is one reason their travels allowed them to see various parts of the country and different kinds of people. They are still traveling.

I thought they would continue on the political path when they attended WVU, but they were burned out. No more campaign speeches? No more pass-outs? So sad for this political stage mom.

Well, I still have Halloween costume ideas and great baby names to give to my friends. I am no longer a stay-at-home mom. I teach fourth grade.  I am able to worm my love of creativity through politics into the classroom.

We are having class elections next week.