-By Janet Raiffa, Contributing Writer, Member & Recruiting Manager. Read all of “Janet Raiffa’s Recessionals” here.

If I lured you in with the title I am pleased to report that I am not walking the street for any illegal erotic purpose.  I may very well consider it further along in my tenure as an unemployed person, but for now I am just soliciting for signatures.   I recently began a short-term position as a political petitioner, and although it’s a job that enables you to play a vital part in our democratic process and allows you to enjoy the great outdoors (albeit during what seems like monsoon season in New York) it’s not for those without a strong tolerance for rejection and the willingness to converse at length with the borderline insane.

Last weekend I answered an advertisement on craigslist for registered Democrats in New York willing to work at least four four-hour petitioning shifts through July 12^th.  I had no idea who the candidate was, but given the laundry list of unusual and sometimes degrading jobs I’ve already accepted for $10 an hour I decided that there was no reason to suddenly become choosey.  My brief phone conversation with a campaign worker revealed that the candidate was running for Manhattan District Attorney, and I was swiftly signed up to attend a training session that would lead directly into my first afternoon shift.

After a busy morning attending multiple screenings of “Transformers” to review the trailers for a market research company (explore www.certifiedfieldassociate.com if you’re interested in getting paid to go to the movies) I headed to Midtown to begin.  Before I go into that, let me just tell you that student field trips have changed a great deal since my elementary and secondary school days.  Nowadays it seems that rather than heading to museums or history-themed villages pupils are being shipped en masse to action movies; both the 10:50am and 11:50am screenings at the Brooklyn cinema I visited were sold out and overrun with unruly groups of 12ish looking pupils.  I arrived at the training prematurely exhausted from traveling up and down nonworking escalators at the theater and rushing back home to enter my report online, and also convinced that I had chosen the wrong footwear and attire for pacing back and forth for hours and remaining perky and persuasive in the face of intermittent showers.

At the introductory session two members of the group were almost immediately dismissed when it was discovered that they were not truly registered Democrats in New York; the organizers ran names and vital details through a database as we began our orientation.  Those of us who remained got a crash course in the art of petitioning.  The goal was to secure at least ten signatures in an hour, fifteen names or more accumulated on the green sheets in sixty minutes would be the mark of a superstar performer.  It was essential that those who signed be registered in Manhattan, any outer borough or tunnel types who tried to assist our efforts would need to be struck out at the end of the shift and would not be counted in the totals we signed for when we returned to the office.  We briefly reviewed the qualifications of our candidate – the most experienced in the field, tough on crime, opposed to the death penalty – and scanned the leaflet we were given as backup.  I took it as a promising sign that I had heard of her, but not of any of the other Democrats or Republican candidates in the field.  We asked a few questions, and then were assigned partners and locations.  I was matched with Anastasia, a shy college student from Queens in a yellow sundress, and we were dispatched to the Westside Market on West 110^th Street.

How do you react when you see a person with a clipboard approaching you on the street?  I have been known to walk across the street and out of my way to avoid people who look like they are soliciting for something, and although I’m ashamed to admit it, I’ve frequently denied being Jewish when faced with missionary types trying to get people to light Sabbath candles.  I’ve never given money to people soliciting on sidewalks for Greenpeace or children’s rights causes.  On the positive side, however, when I cannot maneuver out of the way I will invariably say “I can’t give any money right now, but I’ll be happy to sign something.”  As a former drama minor and frustrated actress, the business of being asked for an “autograph” has its appeal, and I’ve signed for my fair share of candidates looking to get on the ballot.  As we disembarked at 110^th Street I hoped that this good signing-only karma would allow me to amass a decent amount of signatures from the politically active and intellectual types of the Columbia/Upper West Side area.

Once at my station it took me about ten minutes to be able to utter a word, possibly a new record for me.  People looked busy.  It was drizzling, and nobody seemed like they wanted to slow down.  I dismissed everyone with a cellphone held to an ear, and everyone who appeared to be talking to themselves with or without benefit of a visible earphone.  That ruled out about 50% of the initial group of pedestrians.  My sheets and clipboard became dappled with rain.  I huddled beneath the West Side Market awning and bumped into customers gathering fruit.  The manager came out and asked me politely if I could move from in front of the store.  I started to fantasize about the not so long ago days when students clustered around me at recruiting functions looking to get into my good graces to secure a job.  And then I began.  “Are you a registered Democrat in New York?” I asked every passerby who looked of legal voting age.  Some ignored me completely, not even registering that a human being had directed words in their direction.  Some said yes and quickly walked on, others thought I was trying to register them to vote and said “I’m already registered” as they dashed.  Some giggled, seemingly either flattered that I would think they were eligible to vote, or convinced that they were immediately recognizable as Republicans.  A significant number of people seemed not to speak English or pretended not to, and a good chunk of people identified themselves as Independents.  A couple of outspoken people looked at the picture of the  candidate on the back of my clipboard – placed there to reassure that I was not soliciting for money – and said, “Oh no, I hate her.”  Finally, the crowds warmed and I began attracting people who were willing to slow down and sign.

After only an hour or so, clear demographic patterns emerged in those willing to stop and sign.  White men were the least receptive audience and the most likely to be hostile.  This of course only echoed my general difficulties with white men during my dating days.  One man was willing to talk with me, but became agitated when I couldn’t tell him the candidate’s position on whether Bloomberg should be allowed a third term.  “Do your homework next time!” he shouted.  “Bloomberg is an oligarch. He should be cleaning restrooms at the Port Authority!” he added for good measure.  Women were invariably more sympathetic, with black women of all ages and older white women being the warmest and least likely to completely snub me even if they didn’t sign.  Fashionably dressed female senior citizens became my bread and butter; if I spotted a white haired woman coming at me from any direction I knew I’d least get an opportunity to converse.  I also began accumulating what I can only classify as petitioner-stalkers, a diverse group of people who monopolized my time and seemed thrilled to have an essentially trapped person willing to talk with them.  Some homeless men wanted to compare the small change they’d collected to the number of signatures I’d received.  One extremely friendly Hispanic woman insisted that she could do a better job than I could, and started entreating fellow supermarket customers on my behalf.  When she had limited success, she wanted my opinion on how her son, a “very charismatic and popular thirty-seven year old high school principal,” could break into politics.  A man on his way down from Columbia University wanted to know what became of Geraldine Ferraro and Ruth Messinger.  A surprisingly ardent feminist, he expressed dismay that female candidates had not gotten further in U.S. politics, and wanted to know how he could become more involved in addressing the situation.  After telling him everything I could about female political leaders in other countries and the fates of every female candidate I was aware of, I had to politely entreat him to sign or move on because I needed to collect more signatures than his.

During the rainier periods, Anastasia and I journeyed down into the 110^th Street subway station.  She worked uptown while I worked downtown, or she worked the platform while I tried to catch people entering or exiting the station.  I became expert at reporting on the approach of the train while people took a minute or two to sign, and I gamely inserted the clipboard through bars to the track to elicit signatures while I was on the other side.  I helped a large number of foreigners and out-of-towners with directions.  A Frenchman with a wad of cash in his hand approached me soliciting my help to get onto the train.  I swiped my metrocard for him to be helpful, but he did not walk through fast enough to get onto the platform, and I could not explain how long it would take for me to re-swipe my unlimited use card in French.  I showed him how to get the machine to give directions in French, but he could not figure out how to get a one-way card. I finally demanded two dollars from him and tried with the English directions, but completely missed the button for a single-ride card and got befuddled myself.  When I finally got the card and scanned it through for him he somehow ended up having to swing a foot over the turnstile while an angry looking attendant glared at me.  Anastasia, meanwhile, had only gathered two signatures when I had reached three pages, and came over to tell me that she was not cut out for this line of work and was returning to home base.   Being laid off, I realized, could prove an advantage for a job like this.  As a college student she had not really faced the realities of constant rejection – as a laid off person most recently employed by two extremely hard hit industries I was used to entreaties being greeted with utter silence and well able to soldier on.

At home base that evening I was informed that I was one of the most successful first day petitioners, and told that they would love to have me come in as often as possible.  This was a welcome ego boost in a period that hasn’t been particularly easy on my self-esteem.  I also learned that my colleagues had similarly colorful experiences.  One gentleman, for example, was forced to turn in a green sheet with a gaping hole in it after he was accosted by an irate Republican who grabbed his clipboard in an attempt to steal his signatures.

If you think you have what it takes to gather signatures and are a registered Democrat in New York State there may still be spots available, and weekends are an option.  Contact campaign2009nyc@gmail.com with “Paid Petitioning” in the subject line and a resume.