A Sisterhood Writer’s Election Diary
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
7.30 am: Nauseous. Proceed to voting area. Think about the subversive nature of my vote, and how we can’t let Obama take his base for granted.
9.30 am: Subway to office. Keep reminding myself that if the unthinkable happens, more people will be in the streets. The revolution is happening, and it will keep happening. Consider putting my head between my knees, but train is too crowded.
10:00 am: Update Facebook status: “Nauseous until further notice.” Remember to enact social media embargo today. Feed colleagues the remains of my hurricane/election related Fear Baking.
10:15 am: Remember waiting in line in Ohio to vote for Kerry in 2004. Think about crying in my car when he lost the election, not because I loved John Kerry, but because at the time he was the closest thing there was to hope. I don’t drive anymore, but I’m glad crying in public in New York is acceptable.
11:00 am: Friends tell me they’re doubtful we’ll have answers tonight. In 2000, we watched the Bush/Gore election fiasco in the lounge of my dorm. If we have to deal with that again, I’m building a bunker. I have enough baked goods left over, I can make it happen.
12.32 pm: Right, so I don’t actually know how I’ll know anything about the election if I’m not relentlessly refreshing Facebook and Twitter. I suppose I’ll hear screaming, either way. Friend and I go to lunch, discuss how we don’t want to live in a country where the concept of bodily autonomy can be legislated away.
3:10 pm: Give in and check Facebook. See story about a Pennsylvania voting machine getting pulled after it changes a vote for Obama to a vote for Romney. See a friend’s status urging people to vote, regardless of who they vote for. Get angry, because it matters who you vote for. Feel confounded. Drink hot chocolate.
5.34 pm: Is this a joke? Can we possible have a hurricane, a snowstorm AND an election fiasco in the same week? Democracy Now is calling it “Election (Suppression) 2012.”
6.59 pm: Even if Obama wins, we still have to push, revolt and create alternatives to the treachery that exists now. I knew I wouldn’t vote for Obama again if I could avoid it when he endorsed the decision of Kathleen Sebelius to block over-the-counter sales of an after-sex contraceptive pill to girls under age 17. I wasn’t going to choose between a dude making a decision about my body and another dude making a decision about my body.
10.28 pm: Anxiety forces me off the subway three stops early. I call a loved one, who reports that Elizabeth Warren has won the Senate seat in Massachusetts, the state where I was born and lived until I was 22. I’m so happy that I shriek in the street and hang up the phone before he can give me any bad news. At home, my housemates are watching election results online. Claire McCaskill wins in Missouri over Todd Akin. We yell and tweet accordingly. In spite of the joy, I can’t take how tense it is in Ohio and retreat to my room to watch something, anything else.
12.55 am: The loved one calls back, announcing that Obama won. Romney concession speech. I post another Facebook status: “Maybe now Obama can start being the radical socialist I want him to be.” The whole country is tired. I sleep like a two-year-old crashing after a sugar high.
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