I wore my “I voted” sticker to work today and several people asked, “Is it an election day?” Today WAS an election day here on the Planet Ann Arbor. A city council primary in wards 2, 3, and 5. I’m in ward 5. I encouraged the other two Michigan voters attached to the Landfill address to vote and I even told strongly encouraged them who to vote for. I don’t usually do that. I don’t believe in influencing my childrens’ voting preferences and I almost never know who the heck the GG votes for. Not sure I know exactly what he thinks about religion either. Somehow it works out. Er, as long as we aren’t fighting about where the lasagne pan goes…

I’m coming late to the politics thing. I think this is the first election for which I have *ever* done enough research to even sort of understand the issues and what the folks on the ballot believe in and are likely (?) to do with my tax dollars. Our city council has apparently been living in a vacuum the last few years and have become attached to building parking lots and installing big fancy sculptures while cutting basic services like police and faaaarmen and trash pickup, etc. I actually think that it isn’t as simple as I’ve laid it out here but still…

I am sure I sound totally naive about this but I think that political awareness begins on the local level. I don’t know anyone currently on the city council but a former councilwoman lives down the street from me. I *personally* know *two* (count ’em) of the current A2 school board members. One because she used to run the facility where YAG held its summer camp and the other probably *still* has my cell phone number penciled at the top of the two-pocket folder that she carried everywhere during the years we were on the Commie High PTSO board together. I am not bragging about this. These are my friends and neighbors. I love them but I do not always agree with them. They have the interest (not to mention the guts) to run for a higher office than PTO treasurer. I do not.

If, as voters, we start by overseeing our local elected boards and understand where our tax dollars are going, maybe we can learn how this stuff happens and expand our knowledge to the state and national level. At least that’s what I’m trying to do. Not that I don’t have some pretty strong opinions about the state and national situations. I’ll spare you. Actually I couldn’t articulate those opinions if I tried.

Alas, the polls were empty today. What the heck, it is August 2 and a lot of people are not in town. Sometimes I’m not in town. Absentee ballots are easily enough obtainable but yaknow it is just one more thing to do… Stopping the mail (which is easily done in about 30 seconds on the internet) is hard enough.

There was an election here today. I voted. If there was an election in your voting precinct today, wherever you are, did you vote? (No guilt if you didn’t.)

P. S. The election results are in and my candidate won the primary.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 2nd, 2011 at 6:13 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.