In Four Years, Everything (and Nothing) Has Changed

Last week, as I enjoyed a cup of coffee at coffee shop, I noticed a scruffy fellow sitting at the next table. He looked down and out, with straggly hair and a long beard. Sitting on the table in front of him, next to his coffee, was a worn pair of shoes.

To my surprise, he looked up and addressed me by name.

“Hey Jim, it’s me…Matt.”

Indeed, it was Matt von Hoople. Matt was a local reporter who had covered the county for two decades before his newspaper went out of business a few years ago, like so many other local papers. I used to always see him at meetings, sitting in the back of the room with his eyes half-shut. But he always wrote very insightful pieces about local politics.

I asked what he had been doing since his paper folded.

“It’s the strangest thing,” he said.  “It was almost exactly four years ago that I filed my last story before the paper went under. I had a couple of drinks, flopped into bed, and fell asleep. I didn’t wake up until a few days ago.”

I stared at him.

“That’s right, I have been asleep for four years,” he said slowly. “My theory is that it must have been the cumulative effect of sitting through 20 years of Board of Supervisors meetings.”

He looked so sincere that I almost believed him. In fact, my own eyelids were starting to feel heavy, just at the thought of all those Board meetings. He glanced at the shoes on his table and smiled ruefully.

“Brought my shoes in to get them fixed,” he said. “They gave me a cup of coffee instead.” Then our conversation turned to politics.

“I see that Scott York is running again for Chairman.  I saw his billboard,” he said, then sighed. “I remember when Loudoun County had a sign ordinance that prohibited them.”

“They still do,” I replied. “York even voted in favor of it.”

“I also noticed that York is sharing the billboard with someone named Janet Clarke, and that she is running for Blue Ridge Supervisor. I guess that means Jim Burton isn’t running again.”

“No, he’s running,” I said.

“I thought York supported Burton,” Matt said.

“They used to be allies of sorts, but that was four years ago,” I replied. “He also supported Kelly Burk, Andrea McGimsey and other Democrats when they ran. Now he’s supporting their Republican opponents.” 

“So much for loyalty,” Matt snorted.

“Well, since he is a Republican, he’s supporting all the Republican candidates,” I explained.

“But York’s not a Republican anymore,” Matt said. “He used to be, but he left the party to become an Independent.”

“Well, now he’s a Republican again,” I replied. “Said he wants all Republicans on the Board.”

“I guess that means Eugene Delgaudio isn’t running this time,” Matt said.  “There’s no love lost between those two.”

“Actually, he is,” I replied. “And York’s also supporting Dick Black for State Senate.”

“Dick Black’s running again? The same Dick Black who got voted out after he sent plastic fetuses to the Virginia legislature, accessed pornography on the public library computers in view of others, and condemned a high school play he had never seen, just because there was an implied kiss between two male characters?”

I marveled at Matt’s instant recall of these long forgotten facts.

“Yes, but he’s not talking about those issues,” I said. “He’s running as a transportation candidate now. He’s even taking credit for all those interchanges on Route 28.”

Matt choked on his coffee, his eyes bulging, and spewed coffee all over the shoes on his table.

“So York is running against most of the current Board members?  That’s the same thing he did four years ago,” he said. “Things must have gotten really bad over the past four years.”

“No, actually Loudoun County is doing quite well. The county is still growing and adding jobs, unemployment is the lowest in the region, and we’re still one of the wealthiest counties in the country.”

“So he’s running as a status quo candidate?” Matt asked.

“Not exactly,” I said. “He wants all new Board members except for himself and Delgaudio.”

“Didn’t he run against most of the sitting Board four years ago?”

“Yes, back then he ran against the Republican majority on the Board because they were too pro-growth, I said. “He pretty much got the Board he wanted, but now he’s running against most of them.”

“So let me get this straight,” Matt said. “If you like the way things are, you should vote for York, because he’s the guy who’s been in charge. But if you don’t like what the Board of Supervisors has done over the past four years, you should still vote for York, because he was outnumbered by a bunch of Democrats and Independents. Looks like you have to vote for York, either way.”

I nodded. “Looks like.”

“So much for accountability,” he said. “So what will happen if he gets his wish, a Board of nine Republican Supervisors? Who will he run against four years from now?”

I tried to imagine Scott York running next time as a liberal Democrat. Actually, it was easier to imagine than one might think.

“Maybe you should run against him,” I suggested. “You seem to understand local politics better than just about anyone I know.”

Then I looked down at his coffee-soaked shoes and wondered how they could have gotten so worn while he had been asleep.

“Besides, I don’t believe you’ve really been asleep all this time,” I said.

One of his eyes flickered for a second. It might have been a wink. Then he yawned.

“All this political talk is making me tired,” he said. “I’m going back to sleep. Wake me up in four more years.”