Getting the Vote Goat

Posted on November 8, 2005 in Citizenship Liberals & Progressives The Orange

I’ve just finished voting. I walked down the grass shoulder to the Portola Hills Fire Station and got in line. The time was 4:40 PM. Blue-coated boys from St. Michael’s Abbey accepted directions from a 50ish woman in yellow. One boy manned the computer which assigned our ID numbers for the electronic voting machines. Alongside mothers and black-suited businessmen, a fire truck and a paramedic truck that had the title “ORC Squad” painted on its back, I waited my turn.

The front of the line got to me in just two or three minutes. I showed the boy my license so he could find my name on the voter registration rolls. I signed where he asked me to and moved on to the lady in yellow.

“I need your street number,” she said. I showed her my license.

“No, that’s your license. I need your street number.” She was treating me like a liberal and an idiot. I closed my eyes long enough to recite the numbers.

“It’s now the law,” she said as she handed me my ID number and an “I Voted” sticker.

“Do I get a paper receipt,” I asked.

“No,” she said as she left me to my own devices. What a load of shit, I thought as I voted No no no no no no yes yes no no no no.

On my way back up the hill I composed a little ditty which caught my thoughts:

Hey ho lee lay
Reciting street numbers will save the day

My ass.

Tell me what it was like where you voted.