A Day In the Life of a Community Advocate & Organizer

It starts and ends with the emails. So many emails. From 6:00 AM to well past midnight. Responding to aspiring politicos, friendly peers, allied organizations, and others needing subject matter expertise in legal assistance, fundraising, networking, or updates on current events, among a milieu of miscellany.

After that, it's dashing across town for a local event -- coffee with the cops, a community clean-up, canvassing for a ballot initiative or new candidate, maybe attending a rally and protest. Then it's dashing back home to hop on for a few consecutive hours of Zoom calls with fellow activists to research, review, and write up public comments or civic education and outreach materials.

By this time, we're well into the working lunch hour with a less formal meeting between new stakeholders wanting to jump in headfirst or tentative residents dipping their toes in to learn more. Sometimes it's a very formal meeting with new officials hoping to build bridges or test boundaries.

Just as quickly we're back on, racing through the banalities of pandemic life at home -- showers, dishes, laundry, kids, spouses -- before frantically calling into the latest public meeting for city council, commissions, committees, clubs, community-based organizations, boards, affinity groups, and more besides.

Eventually, they end and it's suddenly 11 o'clock at night! Essays to write. Essays to read. Social media notifications to comb through. Breaking news to double-triple check. Calendars to update. And, yes, more emails. Always emails.

On a given day, I will have talked and worked with an elected official, a department head from one or two public agencies, written over a dozen emails, scheduled meetings two to three weeks out, been on Zoom (or an equivalent) for several hours, attended at least one daytime event and one evening meeting for some local organization, as well as, arguably, wasted a good four cumulative hours on social media, usually arguing with someone being loud and wrong.

That doesn't include the weekends, which are not a given day of rest; or the career with mandatory professional development needed to have money to live on; or doctor's appointments, grocery shopping, running errands, and everything else that goes with modern-day adulting.

It's not glamorous. It's mostly thankless. It's often uncomfortable and hectic. At the end of the day, which is usually 1 or 2 AM the next day, it feels like you accomplished everything and nothing all at the same time. Sleep is precious and rare. A personal life is a plate spinning on a stick in your hand. Hobbies? Almost forgotten.

But then there are those small moments: a victory winning vote for a new policy initiative, a fundraising cap hit, a neighbor helped with an administrative hurdle, a local business given new resources, finishing a lengthy negotiation between community stakeholders, or even just being able to speak for three minutes without interruption on a critical issue in a meeting.

Day in. Day out. Day by day. Those small moments are buried and piled up until, in the course of months passing, they become mountains covered with trees. We climb them as they grow and from there, the view is incredible. We can see the path laid out from all sides, all angles, all points time -- past, present, and future. That's when we remember why we do this and who we do it for.

We're building a world not for ourselves, but for our friends, our family, our children. We're creating the life we want for ourselves, but that we never expect to live long enough to enjoy.

I believe it will be beautiful.

Take note and take care.