A long day as we got up at 5:15 and got over to our polling place around 5:40. There were at least 100 people ahead of us then; the doors opened at 6 and we moved steadily forward. The process was easy, the new paper ballots were simple to use and we were out by 6:30. Jill went to class and I went back home to shower and eat breakfast, then went to work. After Jill got home from class and ran some errands, she volunteered to work for the Democrats during the afternoon. That resulted in the interesting situation of us ending up at the Mark Warner victory party in McLean, as the volunteers were asked if they wanted to go.
Jill called me with the news while I was making dinner, and I told her it sounded interesting. We ate at home because we weren’t sure what would happen – we had fried cod and frozen asparagus from Trader Joe’s and some sweet potato fries I baked. It was drizzly and a long line of cars pulling into a parking garage when we got there. We parked and walked inside, where no one directed us but we found our way into the big ballroom with the crowd and the TV cameras. It was interesting watching CNN on a big TV with the crowd lapping up the returns, but they turned it off for speeches from Senator Webb (he joked how he’s now the senior senator), Governor Kaine (basking in the glow of being the first politician outside Illinois to endorse Obama) and finally Warner’s victory speech (much better than his convention keynote).
It was fun, and we had some good conversations, but we were tired and didn’t want to stand there anymore, so we headed home. We watched the Comedy Central Special with Stewart and Colbert (unfortunately missed McCain’s speech while we did), then flipped between the HD news reports until Obama gave his moving speech. Then Jill went to bed, and I stayed up another hour watching returns. What a day, and what a country – very happy right now. He won’t be perfect, but I think he will be great.
I would love nothing better than to be proven wrong 🙂