OH WHAT A NIGHT/DAY!

In my wildest dreams, I never imagined that my kickoff day could be so much fun! At the beginning of the week, to be perfectly frank, I was beginning to get a knot in my stomach. What if no one showed up? What if it rained all day? I spent Wednesday a.m. getting some advice from two of my most media-savvy friends and they not only gave me good observations about my speech but also put my head into a different psychic space. So hats off first to Judy and Cathy for a job well done! First thing Thursday a.m. I was again putting finishing touches on my remarks.....wonder what the effect is that it now doesn't match what's in the press kits but that's someone else's problem. Get to Spring Street (our first stop) at 8:20 and there doesn't seem to be a soul in sight except the inestimable Joe Engwer. He assures me that numbers of people are sitting over at Tunnel City waiting for the action....and indeed they are. I looked quite cheery in my Senator suit and Kim had brought a red lapel flower with a red white and blue ribbon attached for what Myra would call a "splash of red." We ended up having 40 people on Spring Street and what a wonderful sendoff! The most poignant moment came when my friend Jean Donati said "Nadine would have been SO proud of you!" Nadine Kalt died way to early of lymphoma and was a friend, mentor and Mount Holyoke alum. There were MHC alums around all day and so her presence was felt. I'm not sure the people in each crowd realized how MUCH it meant to me to be able to look out at their faces.....supportive and inspiring. Quick stop at the office for additional editing and on to North Adams Regional Hospital. NARH had been kind enough to let us use the new portico as a backdrop and it was a wonderful event. The most special moment was seeing a dear friend who will be undergoing chemo (at the age of 40 no less....) just emerging from the hospital where she'd had a port put in. She looked gorgeous even though she'd just been through a surgical procedure and it did my heart enormous amounts of good to see her. And one of "my elders" happened to be waiting for her ride home and she grabbed a bunch of buttons to take back to her friends. The stop at an AARP luncheon will be left for the book......lunch at Cafe Reva was delicious -- have you EVER had eggplant fries? They're to die for.....and then on to Stockbridge for a TERRIFIC press conference including Carrie Saldo of WAMC who's been my friend and reporter since her days as a cub on The Transcript. (By the time we got home someone had already heard Carrie's piece on the radio...!) The elders asked great questions and we had a good time. No one believed that my campaign chair, Peter Marchetti, HAD REALLY MADE THE ITALIAN COOKIES WE BROUGHT. They all accused him of stopping at Morningside Bakery. You can imagine how good they were if people thought they were from Morningside, the home of Champagne Cake, the official cake of Elder Services. So we are posting his recipe on the website just to prove he made them! We will also be posting some random photos from the day. And the brochures are in! So when people say "do you have any literature?" (I'm usually deaccessioning my life, so I don't WANT more literature. But some people actually won't take MY WORD for it that I'm wonderful. They want it in print.....) I can actually hand them something! It was hard to pull myself away from Heaton Court but we got up to Pittsfield and did our last press conference right on North Street complete with three of the major league hitters of the Berkshire press corps -- Joel Librizzi, Jack Dew and Larry Kratka. As I said later in my remarks at the party, I've been to dozens of these events......BUT THEYVE NEVER BEEN ABOUT ME! The party at Zucchini's couldn't have been better. The venue had been chosen weeks before Joe joined the campaign. On first hearing the plan, he said "YOU NEVER HAVE YOUR KICKOFF OUTSIDE YOUR HOME BASE!" He said if 50 people showed he'd be thrilled. Try double that number. We had Stockbridge, Mt. Washington, Adams, Pittsfield, Lenox, Lanesborough to name a few and of course a WONDERFUL Williamstown contingent. It will not surprise you that I was in bed by 9PM. Which is why I'm up at 3AM posting to this blog. It was a wonderful moment in time. Would that all my campaign experiences lived up to June 15, 2006! Happy Birthday Uncle Bob...!