Ways to Go, OHIO

At 8am I met 4 strangers on the street in the upper west side of Manhattan. A woman came out of her apartment building and gave us keys to her car. She didn't know anyone either. None of us had ever met before. She let these 5 strangers take her car to Columbus, OH (with express pass) all because all of us wanted to help elect Sen. Obama as the next president of the United States.


Rodrigo, Nathan, Svetlana, Pat, and Peter all piled clown-like into a tiny Subaru and headed west to a key state in this scramble for the White House. I get emotional even writing about it because it was so powerful to me. I have to admit I was fearful of even going. Not for safety, but oddly because it was out of my comfort zone at this time. When did I become so set in my ways? It was because I felt this discomfort that I put my body in motion to GO. And I cannot DESCRIBE how happy I am that I did.


Sandi Dubowski, the director of "Trembling Before G-d" whom I know through the film festival circuit mobilized 22 of us through Facebook to come to Ohio for CHANGE. What a man. I will write about him later.


The trip through NY, NJ, PA, WV and finally OH was just a cramped, crowded blast. It was the "stuck on an elevator" scenario where you have 5 strangers who are forced to deal with each in a cramped space. We just had a great laugh the whole way. Peter was wearing a "Sundance Channel" jacket and it turns out we both worked there and knew so many people in common. Small world. Svetlana insisted we stop at Waffle House and played it up as a mecca of carboliciousness. It was. For $6 you got a Flintsonian breakfast with coffee. It was here that we tried to "out-tragic" each other with death, illness, loss, etc. I played my "40 something, unemployed, cancer-surviving orphan" card and Peter's mom was killed in a plane crash this year, and Rodrigo's dad died the day after he came out of a heart attack, but we were beat out when Nathan threw down Leukemia. Odd game, but bonding. (Great writer idea to sneak in exposition!)

Rodrigo and Svetlana outside perfection



Rodrigo and Nathan get posey with hats. I think we are back in college.

Pat and Sveltana.

Then we rolled into what I called "Real World Columbus" - this was a lovely house that was donated for the time to Sandi to house about 17 of us or so. It was just chaos, but full of energy and love. Here is where we met so many of the people we would bond with for the next 3 days or so.

We were zonked from a long drive, but so, so happy to be there.

Sadie, Tammy, Greg and Manny. Real World Columbus

People are mobilizing. Fantastic crew!