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Edited on Thu May-20-10 06:05 AM by krispos42
I'm an enumerator for the Census this year and I'm running around rural Minnesota trying to find all the people that didn't return a Census form. The weather this week is absolutely perfect, 75 degrees and cloudless with gentle breezes. It rained a lot last week, and the vegetation is exploding with life. The air is rich will the smell of freshly-turned soil, pine, and flowers.
And mosquitoes, but that's to be expected.
It's against this backdrop that I pulled up to a house, gather my stuff, and knock on the door. No answer, so I leave a notice and head back to my car.
A woman emerges from behind a somewhat shabby barn and greets me. We exchange pleasantries, I sharpen my #2 pencil, and we get to work.
"Did you or anyone in this household live or stay here on April 1st, 2010?"
Yup.
"Does somebody usually live at this house, or is it a vacation or seasonal home?"
She indicates they live there full time.
"How many people were staying here on April 1st?"
Two.
"Okay, then, let's make a list of all these people. Please start with the name of a homeowner or renter who was living here on April 1st. Otherwise. start with any adult living here."
She names Person 1 and Person 2. Both names are feminine.
"Okay, how is Person 2 related to Person 1?"
"Other", she says quickly, sharply.
"Um, if you could look at List B on your information sheet and pick the best one that would be great" I said, pointing to the column on the piece of paper.
She scans down the list and finds what she wants near the bottom, one notch above "Other nonrelative".
"'Unmarried partner'" she says, a trace of sadness in her voice. "The state won't recognize us".
She purses her lips at this point, still looking at List B.
There was a fair amount I wanted to say at this point. About equality under the law, or the politics of wedge issues, or the power of the Talibornagain. I wanted to express my distaste for her very essence being used by the morally-bankrupt Republicans to whip up voter turnout.
But I couldn't. I was on the Federal clock doing government business, and as I joked before with a Ron Paul type a couple of days ago, when I'm on the Federal clock I have no politics and no God.
I blurted out something like "It'll happen soon, I think", and moved on to the next question.
I felt the inadequacy of my words even as we moved through the rest of the questionaire. She had perked up by the time we were done, so that was good.
I now wonder, writing this, what does a couple that's "civil unionized" put down? And does anybody realize that THAT is the difference between a marriage and a civil union???
Their ages were between "able to run for President" and "not able to collect Social Security". I wonder how long they've been together, and whether they'll live to be able to get married.
:-(
We really need to fix this "oversight".
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