Notes From the Road: Singing Out the Vote in Ohio
October 30, 2008, by Melissa Howden
Three-year-old Dakota in Marietta, Ohio. Photo by M.A. Howden
Yes We Can, Yes We Can, Yes We Can…
I love this country
I love these people
Little red brick houses
Little white church steeple
I love my papa
I love my mama
That’s why I’m voting Barack Obama
As this posts I am just finishing (as tour manager) a nine-city, 11-day tour of Ohio to get out the vote—a traveling, singing, organizing road show with 20 different musicians, all on our own dime, for Sing Out the Vote Ohio: A Suite for Change, created by my longtime friend and social change visionary, Holly Near.
From Toledo to Cleveland to Akron and Kent, Columbus, Athens, Marietta, Cincinnati and Dayton, the good people of Ohio are showing up. They are exhausted yet ceaseless in their efforts to change the face of this election with the eyes of the world upon them.
We’ve performed on street corners, in churches, theatres and student unions, coffee houses and farmer’s markets. In Marietta, Ohio, perhaps the most conservative of the towns we visited, 50 people at the Sing Out Rally committed themselves to five more hours work before election day—the equivalent of six and a quarter full-time work weeks.
I have taken great inspiration from the fact that for every person I have encountered, this election is personal. Everyone is reaching deeper, finding more time, manifesting additional energy from the ether, even though on most days it must feel like pushing a damn boulder up a hill. Every person I’ve met is contributing something, something to make a difference today, knowing that on November 4th the world will change. What a unique and wonderful thing to know that by stepping into this window of opportunity, we all can contribute to changing the world. Imagine.
And from my own vantage point at the wide end of the social spectrum, I am giddy at the prospect of having a community organizer as the President of the United States. The feeling out here in Ohio is one of possibility, and people are organizing and showing up in unprecedented ways to realize the possibility.
“We are all in this together and we are singing, singing, singing for our lives.”
—Holly Near
A young student at Sinclair Community College in Dayton, Ohio has been working with her cohort, Mustu and a few other students, encouraging their fellow students (in fact walking them across the street to the Board of Elections) to vote early. Each day they have averaged 30 students/votes. This young woman whose name is Paige heard about us, called us up and asked in a pleading and tired voice, “Will you come and help me when you are in town?” And so we did. We’d learned only days before on the Ohio State University campus that the music proved energizing and while we were there, the numbers of students getting on buses carrying them to vote early went up exponentially.
…Driving five to the polls….
—emma’s revolution
One man attending the show in Kent, Ohio told us that in the last presidential election he worked himself to the bone, driving people to the polls in heavy rain, putting in hours on the phone banks. When the election was stolen and rigged (this is documented) he sank into a deep depression. He said he didn’t know how hopeless he’d felt until he came to hear this amazing band of troubadours sing and realized that he had a tiny seed of hope and that maybe all was not lost.
In Cincinnati, the St. Auburn Presbyterian Church was full to the brim at the concert, organized by the Cincinnati Women’s Choir MUSE, and the Planned Parenthood Affiliates of Ohio. Planned Parenthood has identified 5000 undecided pro-choice women. The goal of the concert was to rally the troops to call or visit each of these women because Planned Parenthood has found that when you speak to women directly about women’s health issues, they very quickly understand there is only one candidate to vote for. So in the middle of the show, people in the audience were asked to take out their cell phones and call a friend to commit to a couple of hours to call and visit these women. By the end of the night, most of the volunteer slots were full.
Our goal has been to energize the energizers and Get the Vote Out in whatever practical ways possible. From Toledo to Dayton the votes are being cast. A lawyer from New York who attended the Columbus concert said this year will be different. 3200 lawyers are in Ohio from out of state, adding to the several thousand already here, to make sure that every vote cast is counted, and nobody is turned away from the polls. Out here in Ohio, this doesn’t feel so much like a Presidential election as much as a social movement, a groundswell of the change we’ve been hearing so much about.
Many people have been tempted on hearing this music to invoke the ‘60s. But this is 2008 and this group of people would not have come together in the ‘60s. Every night the stage has been peopled with Black people, Native people, Hispanic people, gay and straight, men and women, old and young singing contemporary songs about our lives. This is the face of 2008.
There are five days until Election Day. I am full and I am heartened, by the dedicated people I’ve met. If they are here in Ohio in such numbers, they are all throughout the country. My heart is open, and I am hopeful. If you haven’t already, please exercise your hard won right to vote, and then do what you can to help five others do the same.
I am a 51-year-old, freckle-faced, newly in love, OBAMA-voting gay woman, and I approve this message.
“I Approve This Message” by Roy Zimmerman:
October 30th, 2008 at 9:03 am
I am one of the sickened, sad, embarrassed, disgusted voters who’s heart is maybe not so broken to still believe that we are teetering on the verge of reclaiming all the hope and promise we’ve shown the world we hold.
Thank you Melissa, and your merry band, for showing us that love, commitment, hope, engagement, and a willingness to go there, can make the difference. And, I approve this message.
October 30th, 2008 at 9:23 am
It’s so hope inspiring to know that all those people on the Sing Out The Vote Ohio tour volunteered their time and talent to travel across Ohio inspiring others to vote. That all those people in all the local campaign headquarters that are volunteering their time all across this country, not just in Ohio. The rest of us that can’t make it to the road to get out the word really appreciate the efforts of others are making the sacrifice.
Way to go, Melissa! Get some sleep!
Cheers,
Joanna
p.s. – I approve this message.
October 30th, 2008 at 9:57 am
Thank you, Melissa, for the time and commitment you’ve put into helping get out the vote. After reading a piece in the L.A. Times this morning about how the republicans are up to their necks in dirty voter fraud tricks–and daily emailing with dear friends and family members who are voting McCain–I was feeling very dispirited. But, I feel better now! And, I swear–for the hundredth time–to stop reading the news and opening my inbox until this election is over.
October 30th, 2008 at 10:05 am
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
October 30th, 2008 at 11:29 am
Yay! People are energized and more hopeful than I can remember. Thanks Melissa, Holly, the artists, the students, the everyday people and little Dakota for getting out the vote!
October 30th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Sweet Melissa, you are amazing! I believe that everyone who’s path you and your troubadours crossed were energized by the experience. What a great country this is for all of us, but most of all for Dakota and all the children who’s futures we hold in sacred trust. Thank you from my heart, top to bottom.
October 30th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
If you stop to think about it, Obama’s campaign has been all about music…from Will.I.Am. to Hardy Drew and the Nancy Boys to Melissa Howden and Roy Zimmerman! Almost every day, someone sends me some kind of art that has been inspired by Barack Obama. My son has drawn dozens of pictures of him, my friend Carine the Art Dealer (no relation to Joe the Plumber) has Obama art in her L.A. gallery, I’ve seen dances, pictures, songs, clothing — all dedicated to the hope this one man, the muse of our age, inspires. He brings out the best in all of us. Love him! Love you, Melissa, for taking your art on the road and spreading the hope and love. Or is that taking your hope and love on the road and spreading the art?
Here’s two more that arrived in my in-box today:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fX40RsSLwF4 (from Cheryl B.)
http://vimeo.com/1891426 (from Carine)
November 1st, 2008 at 2:48 pm
Great work all of you! The pride you will feel for the rest of your lives for this effort will be a wonderful inspiration for involvement in many future justice causes.
Pat Humphries and Sandy Opatow are two dear friends who can always be counted on to give themselves to important causes. They’re also pretty super musicians.
Kathleen Sengstock, the senior legislative aide to Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), has taken a combination of vacation and unpaid leave for the last month to work for the Obama campaign in Toledo. I’m flying to Detroit Thursday to hook up with Kathleen and celebrate an Obama victory with her and her family. If McCain manages to steal the election, we’ll be calling the suicide hotline.
Love to you all.
Jim Byrne
Takoma Park, MD
November 4th, 2008 at 6:30 pm
Today’s the day….God/Goddess/Human/Earth willing the outcome will be blessed and hopeful and sweet.
I want to pass this on to you all today….it really touched me and I hope it does the same for you.
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
“No matter who’s elected president, daffodils will bloom
in the spring. Men and women will fall in love and,
sadly, out of love. Inconsolable grief will still be
inconsolable. A broken heart will nonetheless keep
beating one hundred thousand times a day. No matter
who’s elected president, writers will write. Painters will
paint. Three in the morning will still be three in the
morning. The door in our psyche we don’t want to walk
through will still be just down the hall. No matter who’s
elected president, life will hand us the invisible thread
that connects us all; love will hand us the needle”.
– Sy Safransky, from his Notebook in The Sun,
November 2008
November 12th, 2008 at 12:49 pm
Melissa, Thanks for letting me know about the picture of Dakota. She was still up with us when Barak gave his acceptance speech, which was one of the most meaningful things I have ever heard. Dakota giggled and cheered for her “Rock 0 Bama!” and is still going strong. She says she wants Rock O Bama to be her friend almost daily. We tell her he already is, he just can’t come visit, which she finds an unacceptable answer.
Dakota is a voice of hope. Born to a homeless crack addicted mother who was arrested for solicitation when 7 1/2 months pregnant. Mom was taken to the hospital to be checked and doctors did an emergency c section because there was very little amniotic fluid and the cord was calcified. In another few days, Dakota would have been a dumpster baby. She is a miracle. She fought for life and won and she will bring love and hope to all she meets. She says she wants to be a doctor and I could just see it happening if that’s what her little 3 year old self sets her mind to.
Thank you for enjoying her and letting her help get out the vote. We all have a lot to be thankful for this holiday season. The road to change has begun.
And send Holly a warm thank you as well as the other musicians who helped put Ohio over the top.
Shalom,
Kayla
November 14th, 2008 at 10:12 am
Hi All,
Well we are 10 days into a slammin’ victory! I’ve had some amazing experiences in my life, truly inspirational but I have to say the SOTVO Tour and election night rank up there in the top 5. The rally in Marietta where I met Dakota really stand out in my mind. And now to know Dakota’s story I am all the more inspired. When I met her I was struck by her bright spirit and personality. A three year old Dakota dancing at a rally for the first African American President of the United States, well her future was bright and now its brighter. This is the kind of promise I look for. Thank you to Dakota and the many,many, who put themselves out there to give us a real shot at an America we’ve longed for.