Texas Tuesday

The day is finally here. I was planning on voting after work today, but when I woke up this morning I realized I was much too antsy to wait around all day. I got ready faster than I ever have, completely ignoring my hair, and arrived at the polls around 8:20 a.m.

The Texas Democratic Primary (slash caucus) is as confusing as possible, even (especially?) for someone who has meticulously researched the process (me). So I really shouldn't have been surprised that voting at my precinct this morning was unbelievably disorganized. There weren't that many people there at 8:20 a.m., but all of the chaos made for a bit of an unusual (and entertaining) voting experience.

I live in an overwhelmingly liberal part of Dallas affectionately termed "the gayborhood." My voting location, a public library, is within walking distance of countless gay bars, various sex shops, and a very busy Black-Eyed Pea. Needless to say, we were all there to vote for either Hill or Barack.

The main issue was that the Democrat and Republican signs under which everyone was to line up were switched. This resulted in a bunch of us Democrats standing under a red sign and blushing, while new people would walk in, widen their eyes at the mysteriously long "Republican" line, and march right to the front of the "Democrat" line, only to find that, no, they've got to go to the back of the long line and stand under the wrong sign with the rest of us.

I had been standing in line for a few minutes when a volunteer came out of the voting room and yelled, "Are there any Republicans here?" We all smirked at each other, and then a lady wearing a pink tweed suit with an impossibly high hairdo called out, "I'm a Republican! I'm a Republican!" The volunteer ushered her inside. We were all thinking the same thing when the woman next to me said under her breath, "She would be."

After I filled out my voting card, I checked at least three times to make sure that I'd filled in the circle exactly beside Obama's name. And even after I left my voting location, I was infinitely worried that I'd accidentally voted for the wrong person, similar to the worry I feel every morning when I leave for work and become convinced that I've left my straightener on and it will burn down the building. The vote I cast this morning was much too important to botch. But in my mind's eye I can still see the black circle right beside the name Barack Obama. Which is something I've been waiting four years to see.