3/3/20

VOTED EARLY ON the NEW COMPUTERIZED MACHINES LIKE THREE MILLION OTHER CALIFORNIANS

My friend and I were headed to an event when I suggested we just go vote on Sunday - a couple days early - on our way. Our minds were made up.  Why not?

Seems to me, last election, I stood in a line for over 8 hours - my dog beside me - and the next day paid the price. I was so dehydrated and hurting from this ridiculousness that I stayed in bed the whole next day aching.  I did, however, meet a woman in line who was in line with me for half of it - until finally a volunteer came down the line saying people who had their mail in vote in hand could just drop it off.   Four damn hours to drop off?!

She said she was the inspiration for Lou Reed's song Sweet Jane. She told me all sorts of things about herself and her relationship with Lou back in the day in New York and of course I loved every minute of it. 

Waiting in lines. 

I hate it.

At some point you think of all the time you already gave over to the effort and stick with it, like you do in a wrong relationship. At least I was in a park where there was shade from the trees and the day was not overly hot or cold. My dog stayed interested in life by watching for squirrels and salivating at the thought of a kill.  But once Sweet Jane left, I was bored and realized I was also hungry.  Why did I vote early in such an excruciating way?  Because I had a dentist appointment on the actual day to vote - with a dentist who often kept people waiting for hours too. ...

This time voting with the new computerized machines was almost effortless.  I walked in with my list of who I wanted to vote for and tapped a computer screen. The paper ballot paper was then inserted and printed and it slid back out so that you could re-read it.  But not to snatch it. The machine then swallowed the ballot and there must have been some place where all that paper wooshed to and was stored but I didn't see it.  My ballot had one of those strange scannable symbol maps (called a QR code) you sometimes see on products in the store or that you can download.  Voters have their own personal ISBN number.  I can be identified with this, via chip, instead of my teeth, need be. ...

These days I'm not too tolerant of people who don't bother to vote.  My attitude is if you vote then you get the right to complain to me.  If you don't vote, I don't want to hear it. 

Voting for locals is actually the most difficult part.  It can be a townie popularity contest.  The amount of information on any of these locals isn't much so you ask your friends who they've had good experiences with and go from there. 

I went for some years without voting myself.  I thought of my not voting as sending a message that "none of the above" candidates interested me.  Eventually I got re-activated. 

Last Presidential Election Bernie had withdrawn his candidacy and so you weren't supposed to write him in and so my vote was "wasted." Four years later, although I don't agree completely with any candidate, I feel myself more inline with his thinking than ever.  Saturday Night Live's parodies and mimicries have kept me laughing about politics in a damn-serious time.

Often, because I TALK TO STRANGERS, I meet more people who are in dire economic circumstances.

If you're reading this in California, you can now REGISTER TO VOTE the same day you do vote.  You can vote at ANY LOCATION (that QR code will put your vote in the right precinct) and you can even vote if you are street homeless.

Please VOTE!



C 2020 Christine Trzyna