“No one gives you their vote,” Wagon Master, my campaign manager, told me. “You need to go and get it. You need to take it.” “But there are 10,000 doors in St. Paul’s,” I protested. “Then get started. With an election probably a year away, you can get to every door, maybe twice,” said Wagon Master blithely. “Once the election is called, you can knock on all those doors again.

“People sometimes vote for you simply because you ask them to. Democracy can be a very shallow thing. Pundits say that most people vote for the party or leader, that the local candidate counts for only five to ten percent. Of course, that five- to ten-point swing can be the difference between winning and losing. (Note: pundits can be wrong.) St. Paul’s contained roughly 100,000 people, some 70,000 voters, thousands of houses, and too many apartment buildings for my liking, and the pressure was on: my riding is a bellwether — not once in Canadian political history had St. Paul’s not gone to the winning party. I could be the Second Coming of Christ, but if the party or leader failed me I’d be toast. (Note: pundits are often right.)

Campaigning before an election has been called a blessing: you’re pretty much on your own, there’s no specific platform to defend, and a tyro like me could deflect questions about past Liberal follies with “I’m new and want to make a difference.” When the writ is dropped, you get a script and a warning: defend the party at all costs and promote the platform, the leader, or the team, depending on what the polls say. Freelance on policy, and there’ll be hell to pay.

“You get three hits,” counselled Wagon Master. “If you talk to prospective voters, you may bring them onside. If no one’s home, leave behind some literature and flatter yourself into thinking that the voters were grateful you made the effort to see them. Finally, you create buzz by being in the neighbourhood.” Buzz — that sounded good. It would be all about my earnestness, I expected, my refreshing new face. Instead, “buzz” amounted to “This young man came to my door last evening, said something about running in some election for some party. I can’t remember his name.” I knocked on 5,000 doors and had zero name recognition.

Some people insisted I wasn’t who I thought I was. At one door, I introduced myself as the Liberal candidate in the upcoming federal election. The elderly woman looked very upset. “How could that be?” she asked. “Has something happened to dear Mitchell?” “Mitchell?” I said. “Yes, Mitchell Sharp,” she replied. “He’s just fine, I believe, giving lots of help to the leader as his senior adviser,” I said. “Well,” she said, “then you can’t be our candidate — he’s our MP.” She shut the door. Mitchell Sharp was first elected in 1963. He resigned his seat in 1978. This was 1993.

Some people weren’t sure who they were. A man told me, “I was once an MP.” Embarrassed that the voters’ list was incomplete and that I had not recognized his name, I asked, “When did you serve?” He looked back at me blankly and turned to his wife. “When was I an MP?” “I don’t remember, dear,” she said. Some young kids were playing street hockey as I went door to door. One of them asked me, “Hey, sir, are you anybody?” I wasn’t sure. Maybe I’m Mitchell Sharp, I thought. (Years later, now a big shot MP and parliamentary secretary to the minister of finance, I appeared on I was told that I needed media training, needed "to be repackaged" to be more comfortable on-camera. I thought this unnecessary but agreed to go through with it. In a staged interview, I was asked, "Why are you running?" My answer looped backward in time and thrust forward with hope and enthusiasm. "That was great. Now let's just try to cut it down a wee bit." They ran the tape. I had given them my life story. "Let's do this again after you've been to some more doors," I was told. I was hustled out of the studio. (Note: while campaigning, it is useful to have an assistant interrupt passionate soliloquies with "Barry, we need to move along, other people are waiting to meet you.") I learned to appreciate that interlocking bricks are fundamental to the Canadian economy, that many concrete front stoops are falling apart, and to never accept an invitation to "come in for a drink" or to "sit for just a moment." There are lots of good people out there -- some incredulous that anyone would want to be a politician, yet encouraging you to soldier on -- but lots of wackos, too. Some are lonely, others obsessed. Some just want to bend your ear. Worst of all, partisans from competing parties will try to tie you up. "Just one more question," they say.

"Where do you stand on abortion?" asked the woman through a half-opened door. "I'm pro-choice," I said cheerily. "That's all I need to know," she said, moving to shut the door. "But surely you're not going to make up your mind based on that one issue alone, are you?" I said. "You bet I am, sonny boy," she replied squeezing the door hard against my foot. "Where you stand on abortion tells me everything I need to know about you." My first encounter with the single-issue voter, and I was lucky to get away with my foot. Turning to my volunteer, I said, "Mark her down as a maybe."

A few days later, I knocked on the door of a friend's mother. "Oh, Barry, come in," she said. "I'm just sitting around with a group of old friends." Against the best advice I had been given, in I went. Seated in the living room, I was stunned to see a who's who of pro-choice activists, including Dr. Henry Morgentaler. "Where do you stand on a women's right to choose?" he asked. My toes were secure here.

The nastiest people told me immediately that they were voting for the Reform Party. They were pissed off at something or someone, and they were looking for payback. These encounters were short, vitriolic. “Thank you for your time,” I said.