With the passage of the 2007 continuing resolution in the Senate
yesterday, ONE Regional Organizer Stephanie Handler asked me to write a
post explaining why I think it’s easy to contact senators and to do
political work from my home. She is a really cool gal and I really get a
kick out of her calling me occasionally.

I live in a little mountain town in Arizona and I contacted my two
senators back in January about the resolution, but I found the task a
bit light, so afterward I decided to write every single senator in the
country a personal email. It took about two weeks at about two hours per
day. No big deal.

I looked up every senators’ email address
and then found out enough about each person so that I could personalize each message. Since ONE is all about logical and efficient ways to serve the needy persons abroad, it was not hard to find a moment in each senators’ life when he or she had addressed the needy in some way.

I home school my 10th grade son, and he found my information-seeking to
be pretty interesting, as well. We both learned a lot about the folks
serving our country in Congress.

You’re thinking I’m a young mother with too much time on my hands. In
fact, I am fifty years old and very busy.

I believe that every citizen can make a difference. If you have ever
traveled outside the US you have probably discovered that our little
planet is just that: a little planet. All of us humans have a connection
to each other, and when there is a problem somewhere it trickles down
and eventually affects everyone’s quality of life. I tell my son and my
students to look at the big pictures and then fill them in with all the
little pictures of life. Become a part of the little pictures and state
your opinions. When politician gets out of touch with their
constituents, I often wonder if it is because we as citizens forget to
include them in OUR lives. And I don’t just write to my senators and
congress-persons when I am upset about something, I like to write them
about the good stuff they are doing too.

I hope this may help maybe one or two people to see that it is pretty
easy to get involved. I also hope it helps you to feel that you, as an
individual, can make a huge difference in the decisions and actions that
go on in this world. And you know what? Getting involved makes being a
citizen of earth fun. Get active and have fun doing it!