Next School Board Candidates’ Forum: Thursday evening at 7, Council Chambers at City Hall, sponsored by the League of Women Voters.
I wonder, a friend asked the other day, who is going to draw more votes in the School Board election, Roger Maxwell or Gary Abrams?
A valid question.
Even though Mr. Maxwell, a perennial candidate, withdrew weeks ago, it was too late to erase his name from the official ballot.
When absentee ballots were mailed out two days ago, here is how the six names were arranged for the three open seats in the Nov. 3 election
Robert Zirgulis
Gary Abrams
Kathy Paspalis
Alan Elmont
Karlo Silbiger
Patricia Seiver
Roger Maxwell
Since Mr. Abrams, singlehandedly, has turned himself into the Sore Thumb candidate in a fairly formless race, there may be a good chance he is steadily reducing his vote total down to Mr. Maxwell’s inactive neighborhood.
By now, Mr. Abrams’s tastes are a well-whipped horse. The drained nag should be left to expire in peace, not to mention earned solitude.
It seems increasingly unlikely Mr. Abrams will make more than a vague showing. His only hope may lie in engineering something stunningly redemptive in the next three weeks.
Conversely, Mr. Maxwell’s predicament saddens me.
Once, he may have been an effective School Board member.
A half-dozen years ago, when he was fresh as breakfast rolls to a curious community, he was provocative, entertaining, imaginative, and Culver City voters were in an agreeable mood.
Folksier and older than his rivals, the retired Mr. Maxwell was as ripe as spring fruit, and Culver City, complementarily, was hungry for new ideas.
No one realized that on a sad November afternoon in ’03, Mr. Maxwell would attain high tide and never return to that near-miss level.
Weeks after the election, following counting, more counting and recounting, Mr. Maxwell finished in a flatfooted tie with the strongly favored incumbent, Stew Bubar.
The tie was snapped by gathering in the crowded, overheated Board Room of the School District offices where the superintendent played a silly child’s game with marbles to settle the seat.
Although Mr. Maxwell never would come close to that zenith moment again, he made a character statement that night that remains etched in my memory.
The silly game, I recall, centered on what color marble the Super would pull out of a crinkly bag — had nothing to do with the prowess of Mr. Bubar or Mr. Maxwell.
The instant the marble-pull favored Mr. Bubar, I turned to watch Mr. Maxwell — a steely study in magnificent aplomb. Committed as he was, emotional as he was, he had to be churning internally — but only his family knew for sure. That is class.
Losing in private is a separate experience. You can throw a tantrum or even spit.
When the world is looking, you better maintain your poise. If not, people will remind you until the day after you die.
In subsequent elections, Mr. Maxwell’s former freshness receded. He became an also-ran.
Timing, they call it.
