Shut up, Already

He looked more like he belonged on the block slinging rocks — ‘do rag wrapped tightly around his head, red, white and blue Tommy Hilfiger warm-up suit and spankin’ new white Nikes. He was a big brotha with a quick smile.

I paused in the driveway, rolled down the window of my friend’s late-model Saab, punched the Hip Hop down and took the fliers from him.

“Do you know where to go?” he asked.

“All the way in the back, right?”

“Right,” he said.

Of course, I knew exactly where to go and what to do. I’ve been voting at that same precinct on the East Walnut Hills/Evanston border for six years.

I was giddy. I don’t know if it was because, as a diabetic, I hadn’t had my morning dose of insulin yet or if it was the weight of the election and its impending outcome, but I was feeling light-headed and hollow.

In the pot-holed parking lot, I spied a former neighbor working himself back into his car. He’s had a stroke and is now using a cane. The left side of his body is dead, and the cane hung from a limp left arm as he carefully maneuvered his way back into his white Cadillac.

I lit up. Although I never really cared for him when I lived next-door to him, I thought it was a good sign for voter turnout that this man, recovering from a stroke and moving oh-so-carefully, could make it to the polls in the flesh.

We chatted, something about voter turnout, and I went inside, fliers in hand. With the exception of the brotha checking voters in, it was the same cast of characters volunteering as in elections past. It looked more like a black church social — old black women gossiping and passing around candy.

They take their posts quite seriously, though. I imagine they’ve lived long enough to know a time when, by law, they couldn’t vote.

So I got all checked in. At around 10:30 a.m., I was voter No. 100. It was crowded enough that I had to wait briefly before I got my card and stepped behind the silver aluminum James Bond-like collapsible booth.

By the time I did, sweat had formed on my forehead and lower back. I thought I was going to pass out from lack of food and insulin. Wouldn’t that have been funny, me laid out on the floor of the booth, the little old black ladies scurrying around and the debacle eclipsing the election?

OK, maybe not. So I put the card in backward at first, but once I got started there was no stopping me.

In elections past, voting had always felt like a test. I’d stand there, overwhelmed by the right, responsibility and physicality of voting, and blankly stare at the card. I admit to voting for candidates not because of where they stood on issues but because of how their last names sounded or how cool their commercials were. Stupid, right?

But if 17 years of voting have taught me anything, it’s taught me to study the issues, form an opinion and follow the candidates until I’m about ready to puke. By then it’s usually Election Day, and the whole thing’s over quicker than a bowel movement and usually just as satisfying.

There were several presidential candidates whose names I didn’t even recognize. I fleetingly considered voting one way but ended up giving my vote to Al Gore. I also voted for Tim Black, John Cranley, Todd Portune and yes on Issue 33. The others I can’t remember off hand, but I do know that I didn’t vote in the unopposed races, my first time using that tactic.

I share my votes with you not to be boastful or because this is fantasy football, but because I’m proud of my choices and I trust you enough not to go ballistic over my audacity in publishing these choices. You don’t have to like who I picked, just respect it. And time will tell if any of us made the right choices.

Meanwhile, if you didn’t vote, you missed out on one of the most extraordinary privileges you’ll ever have. If you’re a non-voter, do not whine to me if you’re dissatisfied with how things are going after the results come in and we all settle back into our everyday lives.

If you chose not to vote, then you chose to be seen and not heard.

This article appears in Nov 8-14, 2000.