Believing in The Man and women...

On Primary Election Day Tuesday, I opened the doors at 5:30 a.m. with the knowledge of 10 poll workers and the possibility of a very light day of voting at hand. At the end of the day at 8:00 p.m. nearly 500 people had voted at this little community center in my neighborhood. Me and the Depot Judge (poll worker of the opposite party) who were both Gen Xers equally disillusioned from last elections followed our very specific route to the poll depot. There were tons of police and election workers about. The security was high as the long line of cars indicated that the polls were closed and accounted. We dropped off all of the equipment and both let out a "woot!" because it was awesome! (I had been fantastic to be a part of the process. It had been awesome to watch little kids try and help their parents vote. One little boy ran back and grabbed the piece of paper he had been scribbling on and tried to put it in the machine. Elderly people voted. Young parents did too. There were 5 older poll workers and my site, three high school students and two Gen Xers.) It changed my mind and that of my colleague and maybe, just maybe the system worked. Just maybe voting did change things. Maybe it wasn't all smoke and mirrors after all. And I couldn't wait for the election in November.

I had a friend take me out for drinks afterwards to thank me for my civic duty which was nice but even better was my restored faith in the system. I had wished I could do this in Cleveland, where the disillusionment is even higher as are the risks and the distrust of government. Washington state is moving to an absentee ballot only system - which means higher voter turnout. I'm not sure that would work in Ohio. I think people would be afraid their ballots would disappear or get lost. As they have.

The rest of the week was equally exhausting ending in setting for the second to the last Rat City Roller Girl bout. I got there after a happy hour drink with friends to assemble bleachers, scrub the "track" (um, not my favorite task), put up signs and turn an empty hangar into a magical space. A bunch of us headed out to a favorite Seattle dive - the Nite Lite - where one of our skating girlfriends worked to have beers and silly conversations. The bout last night was incredible and it has become just so much fun to be a part of this great sisterhood of female athletes who kick each others butt, push each other down and then drink a beer to such an event. I love being a tiny part of this.