I Never Promised You A Rose Garden

Being a widow has allowed me the ability to watch eight years of Hallmark Christmas movies without criticism, but there are times admittedly, when it’s just not fun going it alone. Take vacations for example. I’ve been following a winery in British Columbia which coincidentally shares my maiden name. They don’t have distribution in America so it's going to take traveling there to buy their wines. A trip half-way across America is not something I relish doing alone-especially since it’s at least a four hour drive from the nearest airport. Ideally, I envision a week to see the Napa Valley of Canada.

This year, after a friend lost her husband, I found the perfect playmate for such an adventure next summer. I reasoned I would take a second job so I wouldn't have to bust into my piggy bank.

In January, about a week after the World Health Organization identified a virus with 59 cases in a god-forsaken place called Wuhan China, I signed up to be a part-time enumerator for the 2020 US Census. I mean, how hard could it be? Wingman's father had done it a couple of times, and I remember him dressed in a suit and tie, going out with nothing but a clipboard. He filled out a weekly report and I guess he enjoyed it, because after he retired, continued as a supervisor.

As the pandemic worsened, working for the Census Bureau seemed about as elusive as the vaccine. I was surprised to be called in June for fingerprinting because the news reported that there might not even be a census. Two months later, they offered me a seasonal position. I was sworn in, and like my father in law, was given a clipboard (plus a phone, a couple of masks and a bottle of hand sanitizer). 

Virtual training included overcoming resistance, which involved canvassing more than just houses with rose gardens and white picket-fences. My territory included housing projects in two towns-places where people didn’t want to be found much less counted. My phone was loaded daily with addresses and most had notes from enumerators who had already attempted contact with them. More often than not, the notes warned that the resident wasn’t friendly.

It was gritty. Some days there were more dangerous “don’t even think of going there” addresses than ones to see. I went into buildings that had poor lighting, no air conditioning and smoke detectors that beeped incessantly. In one building where the security door was off its hinges, I waded through a landing full of Mountain Dew bottles, chicken bones and cigarette butts. I got chased off a porch by a lady with a broom. A guy in dreadlocks blew pot in my face hoping I would leave (like other enumerators had already done). He was stunned when I wouldn’t back away, smirked and told him that it reminded me of when Wingman was in a band and could we please just finish the questions? The police asked me to leave a place where minutes before, a shooting had just occurred and a teenage girl warned me to avoid the crack house two doors down from her apartment because, “they don’t like white people.”

There were also bright spots. I could hear coaches positively impacting the lives of the football team practicing at the high school across from the projects. An enthusiastic bunch of kids who were registering people to vote insisted they see me to fill out their census. Clients offered cold drinks on hot days (and sometimes Watchtower pamphlets). One Saturday, a Mariachi band paraded down the street in front of a newly married couple and an impromptu parade happened.  Heck, I even got hit on. Twice.

It ended much more abruptly than it began. A supervisor met me in a Welsh Farms parking lot and took all my supplies and that was it. Both towns finished above their 2010 results so I celebrated alone with a glass of wine.

It wasn't my namesake wine-that will come sometime later next year. But after this crazy pandemic summer that included seeing a shooting, a crack house and even getting chased with a broom, I can only think of one thing:

That damn Canadian wine had better be worth it.