a break from the rat race

Today was election day. I would normally insert something like a sunny "I'm crossing my fingers!" or "I feel like this is our year!", but things have been so bleak for even moderate liberals that I simply don't have the energy. No energy for hope? What would Barrack Obama say?! In any case, the kids had the day off from school, meaning I had the day off from work.

We ran a few errands in the morning, including stopping by the polls. The afternoon was blissfully spent doing NOTHING but playing and walking out at a local park, Little Creek Reservoir, with neighborhood friends and the Jamies' kids. The new play area for this park has been under construction for, oh, more than a year and is actually still closed to the public. But since it's all in who you know, one of my neighbors is the acting director of the county's rec department, so when neighbor Greg called (yes, this is the Greg that darling E flipped off), Seth told us to just park on the road and hike in to the brand new playground, regardless of the "Closed" signs. This also meant we had the park to ourselves all afternoon. And what a glorious afternoon it was. Yowza. It got up to about 75, brilliant blue skies, and the trees are at their peak. Imagine a picture perfect autumn day, and there you have it. We hiked down to the reservoir, and the kids played with cattails from the lake's edge, hiked through the leaves, played frisbee and freeze tag at the playground, and just hung out all day. Here are a few pictures. (Just click on them to get a bigger version):


Beautiful red colors at the entrance. I'm not completly sure, but I think the brilliant reds are dogwood and maybe some oak.


Did I say I wasn't going to talk about the election? Well I lied. I found that going into the school today to vote, doing all the familiar things associated with that, brought out a wave of sadness like I wasn't expecting. Truly. I think many people believe that when people like me go on and on about depression and despondancy after last year's elections, that we're overdramatizing things, perhaps for a laugh. But no. Nope. I remember sobbing and sobbing while driving home last November, big fat tears like I haven't cried in some time. For about a month after the election, my friends and I would greet each other with long, heartfelt hugs. No words were necessary. The sadness among us was ubiquitous. Several of my friends couldn't go to work the next day. (seriously). Last year was beyond lunchroom discussions and esoteric kinds of political talk. Last year hurt like hell. I felt sucker punched and couldn't understand how so many people could be so ignorant. [Yah, OK, so I'm falling over into deep biases here, but this is how I feel.] I knew it hurt, but until I voted again today, I didn't realize how much my hopes had been pummeled.


Here is my sweetie during our walk. He and Robert spent hours balancing cattails on their fingers, noses, chests, ears, shoulders... They tried doing handstands and balancing them on their feet, but neither was tall enough to reach the other's feet whilst in a handstand. Funny boys. I think I can see a glimpse of teenaged Quinton peeking out at me from this picture.


This year, our governor is up for election. The current governor, Mark Warner is a Democrat and has ended up an extremely popular guy. He took the financial mess that our last Republican governor left the state in, and cleaned it up. Yes, I know that general economics has a lot to do with that, but he was able to work with a very conservative house and pull consensus decisions out of a hat. Don't know why we limit our governers to only 1 four year term around here. But we do. So now we've got another race to vote in. It's been ugly, too. The GOP candidate is just absolutely nasty, and I'm hearing that from all sides of the political spectrum. Yuck. Again, though, I have not much energy for hope. I think we fat and spoiled Americans have forgotten how to think, and are willing to be led around by our noses by corporations.


So all in all, I spent today in the most perfect way. We played and walked and talked and laughed and I didn't think again about the elections until we got home. I have faith that the pendulum continues to swing and that one day things will get better. I think. In the meantime, it sucks to be living through this mess. But it doesn't suck to be living.