When the Linden trees blossom, I think of the Census. Three years ago now, I was going door to door with a clipboard, rubber bands and the perfect No. 2 pencil. Though well equipped in supplies, I wasn't prepared for the hostility I met.
"I already sent mine in," people said without hello, and without opening their screen doors.
"It's illegal! I sent mine in and you are trying to count me again. This is fraud!"
The gist was that the government was cheating them, and I was the thief.
I thought back to other people who went door-to-door collecting information. Old city directories, the ancestor of that relic The Phone Book, are terrific lists. You can see who lived where, and, up to a certain date, occupations are recorded, too.
In Troy, there are a great number of collar and iron jobs. In the Cohoes section of the 1917 edition, I can see that my grandfather boarded with his mother and worked as a clerk.
Did people balk when this data was mined? Or did they deliver their facts freely and speak politely to the person at the door?
The level of resistance to the census seemed out of proportion. I didn't have to gather many details, yet the survey was seen as invasive.
What we were doing with pencil and paper was nothing, really, especially considering recent revelations of surveillance.
Most people didn't have a hint of the scrutiny their electronic lives were under at the time.
I love the sweet wafts of Linden, but they carry memories I'd like to correct with time travel.
I wish I could work for a city directory. I bet I'd get a much friendlier reception if I knocked at my own door and met the people whose names are recorded, the people who slept where I sleep and lived their very different lives.
Amy Halloran is a Troy writer. Her website is at http://amyhalloran.net
