We Didn't Take The Bus

     Tam and I react to stress in typical ways: we get snappish and prone to argue.  But that's not all of it.  I fret over my appearance (oh, the vanity!) and dawdle; she wants things done on the bounce, hup, hup!  She wants to get it o-v-e-r and move on.

     So of course we were running late and as I tried one more time to keep my bangs from looking as if a cat had slept in them (not unlikely), Tamara made a Command Decision: "I'll drive us to the polling place.  The bus will take too long."

     And in short order, thus it was done.  Of course there was nowhere to park in the small lot at the little neighborhood church where we usually vote.*  She dropped me off and went in search of a spot.  I walked over to the end of the line, got there and realized it was just a bend: the line was twice as long as I had thought!

     At the real end of the line, a woman with campaign literature greeted me.  She turned out to be the at-large school board candidate I had decided to vote for, who was very much at large: "This is my second stop and I have plenty more to visit before six this evening!"  Not especially well-funded, she was applying shoe leather to the problem, exactly the kind of initiative my research had led me to expect from her.

     Tam showed up after a few minutes and the line moved along briskly.  We were inside the building and getting our ID checked in less than thirty minutes, and had voted before another fifteen had passed.

     That's done.  Poll workers said turnout had been steady at about that level, with a little bump up during morning rush hour.  They were hearing that other sites were at least as busy and some were much busier.  As divided as opinions are about Mr. Trump, he's been a real boon to voter turnout: people are motivated to vote against him or for him, but they are certainly motivated.

     Now we'll wait for the results.
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* Indianapolis/Marion County took advantage of Indiana's voter ID laws to implement "vote anywhere:" your ID calls up the appropriate ballot for your address and you can go to any polling place.  Most people still vote at their old familiar spot, but even those move around.  While living in and near Broad Ripple, I've voted at a synagogue, a temporarily unused public school building, the gym of a private Catholic elementary/middle school and at least two different churches.  Voting in the United States remains a wonderfully amateur, slapdash affair, despite sophisticated machines and a small core of dedicated professionals: the poll workers are just plain folks, trying to maintain a little order in chaos without a whole lot of direction.  Lines snake around almost at random and you do end up getting what you need when you need it, but it often seems unlikely until it happens.  I trust this process: it hasn't got sufficient organization to enable cheating.