Happy Election Day!

Last night I sat gazing out Helen's window into the woods behind the house, feeling a roving sense of anticipation and excitement.  It was like the rare night, once every few years, when snow is forecast for Georgia. Something new was being carried towards us on the wind. My friend Jana emailed from South Dakota that it felt like Christmas Eve. "What in the name of heaven is going on in NORTH Dakota?" I emailed back, as North Dakota, like Georgia, appears on a few electoral maps as "in play." 

Today, half-savoring, half-fearing the passing of the hours, a last bit of silliness is zipping about by email among far-flung Democrats, strangers to each other and yet intimately connected in the dream of an Obama White House.   

My friend Judith forwarded it to me. It's funny, an operatic-like song, "Don't Speak for Me, Sarah Palin." The pianist wears moose ears.  Click here or paste this into your browser to see it:  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bh9BmNuqeiQ


  I sent it to my friend Tema in Connecticut and she just emailed back, "I'm really going to miss all of this stuff. Aren't you?" 

I will miss it!  I'll miss clicking on those maps and watching the colors of states like Virginia and North Carolina mysteriously fade from red to pink, to pale blue.  I'll miss reading The Huffington Post first thing every morning, to see my own concerns and beliefs plastered across the screen in their headlines. I'll miss getting the political Cartoon of the Day from my cousin Max in North Carolina. 

But those losses will be more than replaced if dignity, intelligence, and common decency are restored to the White House and to America's image abroad by a President Barack Obama picking up the reins of government. 

I voted last Thursday.  I stood in line for an hour-and-a-half in surprisingly bitter cold (for Atlanta), my fingers and toes turning numb, as we all joshed and shuffled forward, Obama supporters easily outnumbering McCain supporters--if there were any--ten to one.  Today Yosef and I will serve coffee and doughnuts to voters in line at the elementary school.

I can't even relay to my Ethiopian children how game-changing, how historic, how earth-shaking this election could turn out to be.  I think it's because they're used to black presidents. 

Go vote, everyone!  Vote for Obama!