Voting

This is where I vote — where I voted for Hillary, and Obama before that, and for so many candidates over the years. When I first moved to the neighborhood, it was at the school, which I liked better. As churches go, a Unitarian church isn't a bad compromise, but I would feel better if there was more of a separation between church and state. It's where I've voted almost my whole life; prior to that it was the synagogue on Summit.

I've voted absentee exactly twice, in 1988 for Dukakis because I was in college and in 2002 for Wellstone because I was going to be on tour on Election Day. Then Paul's plane went down and retrieving my ballot was incredibly difficult. At first they said I could not because there was not a candidate determined, and I said I would just write in Mondale because I knew that's who it would be. Then they said there was no way to do it at all. Then a TV crew walked in and all of a sudden it became easy to get my ballot. 

But I still wait until Election Day. I think of my friend Judy, who used to send members of the family down at different points during the day to vote so they could see how it was going. That family took voting seriously.

I've missed voting in exactly one election, in 2000 or so, in a primary when city council was the top of the ballot — when I had a fever of 103 and couldn't stand up. I still feel bad about missing it.

Our precinct (W1, P7) is usually quiet and we usually run into neighbors. There were lines in 2016, but usually there are not. Patrick jinxed it by saying that, and then he had to wait in (a short) one today. When I went, after picking up Beatrix sick from school, the scanner was down but they had a back-up plan.

I served as election judge several times there. I swear we have the nicest voters in the state.

I smiled when I pulled my Midnight Madness flyer off my car and felt bad for not going out last night. I briefly flirted with the idea of being a poll watcher this year, but could not take off the time. I did send A LOT of postcards.

Beatrix voted today in mock elections at school. It's the first time she's encountered minor parties like the "Legal Cannabis Now" party — "Mom, how is that even a political party?" She's finally old enough to understand where the term DFL comes from, and why Minnesota is so different that way.

I miss the times when elections were important because you were all pulling together for a candidate, but when, if their opponent won, you didn't feel despondent (of course, this is Saint Paul, so my local candidates usually won anyway). It's all gotten so polarized, and so high stakes. I don't like it.

I'm going to stay at home tonight and nervously sit and listen to MPR and think about past election day parties (does anyone even have those anymore?), and free apple pie at Fern's with your I VOTED sticker, and hope deeply for friends that are running, and miss Wellstone, and remember the time we stood in the Lake Monster parking lot as Erin Murphy was about to walk in and give her concession speech when she leaned over and looked Beatrix in the eyes and said "I BELIEVE in you."

So that's what I want. And I know holding out hope for it will likely crush me, but I can't help it.