A Wonderful Calamity

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Yesterday should have been a shitty day.

I woke up nauseas and filled with bile after hearing President AssHat call the coronavirus a hoax. That man is a living argument for abortion and atheism.

When I got to my polling station for Super Tuesday (it had been changed  to a far less convenient location for some reason), cars were gridlocked. The geniuses in the party had selected an elementary school as the new station, as it could hold more ballot boxes. Fair enough.

But the school was at the end of a quiet cul de sac, and it was a school day. By 2:30 p.m., tiny Basset Street looked like the 405. Volvo station wagons backed fearfully down the street as kids darted about. When you did find a parking spot, a line that led out the auditorium and into the parking lot awaited you. There, too, adults and kids had to play bullfighter with the cars, narrowly dodging iron bulls.

After a 35-minute wait, I reached the auditorium — where an election volunteer announced that the entire system crashed. In an exasperated monotone, she listed other voting polling places as if she were reading school closures after a heavy snow. Van Nuys Elementary. Van Nuys Animal Shelter. Bueller. Bueller? She didn’t bother with addresses.

After much muttering, the people in the auditorium dispersed. One woman yelled at a volunteer for not having a backup system, as if that were his task. After she was done berating him, I walked up. “You guys should hang a sign outside so people don’t go through the hassle of parking and waiting,” I told the man, who was frantically packing up tape and boxes.

“Thank you,” he said without looking up. “You should call the party and suggest that.”

I sighed and walked out, then began walking the length of the line to tell them that the system and crashed and they were misdirecting us.

Not a single person moved, asked a follow-up question or even acknowledged the warning they were in for a half hour cattle call.Image result for super tuesday long lines

And that’s when the day turned. I realized: They weren’t moving because they suspected I may be trying to discourage them voting. And they weren’t having that.  I looked: That was a longer line than I’d ever seen for a California election, including Obama’s. I heard: People were joking, laughing, and seemingly unconcerned with the bureaucratic hoops they had to leap to vote.  When I got home I saw a local news report from another polling place that had also fritzed out. Regardless, the reporter said, people planned to wait the estimated 1 1/2 hours to get the machines back up. And you just know they waited longer than that.

But it’s hard not to feel the palpable energy in the populace. I had received no fewer than three texts and two visits from political volunteers leading up to Super Tuesday. Friends reported the same. People seemed ready to brawl. The silver lining on the day now felt blinding.

I still don’t think Trump will give up the keys to the White House, even if he suffers landslide losses. I still think he’ll appeal the election up to a Supreme Court he owns. That fucking pisses me off.

Yesterday I learned I hardly own the patent on the sentiment.