Baracking the Vote

Spending an election year abroad is a strange thing. What’s even stranger is coming back two weeks before the election, essentially diving right into the fray.

On the surface, my world isn’t much different. Much like in San Francisco, Obama is the Complete Rock Star in Europe, bigger than Michael Jackson, bigger than the Beatles, bigger than (dare I say it) Jesus. You’ve seen the pictures of the enormous crowd attending Obama’s speech in Berlin. Perhaps you’ve seen the Economist’s global electoral map—if only the world could vote! To the French, Obama truly symbolizes hope. Many people confessed that for France’s foreseeable future, there’s no way a black man could make it so far in politics. Although the French have conflicted feelings about the American Dream, they can at least cut past their suspicion of capitalism to acknowledge that America truly is the Land of Possibility, in ways that reach far beyond the marketplace.

Bolstering the French fervor over Obama was the relative lack of knowledge of his opponent. “McCain who?” was rolling off every Parisian’s lips—including the media’s. I spent countless hours elaborating on the GOP hopeful to my English students, dispelling the overgeneralization that he's GWB #2 and arguing that although he wouldn’t be getting my vote, he wasn’t all that bad (well, that was until he announced his unfortunate choice of a running mate, the economy imploded, and the McCain campaign went haywire).

I talked about the election constantly—on a daily basis, in fact—with my students and with French and expat friends. I obsessed over the news coverage, my anxiety building. It wasn’t as bad as Larry David’s, but at one point my husband asked me to stop talking about the election with him, as his vote was already decided and my constant chatter was stressing him the hell out. What would happen to our collective anxiety once we moved back to the States in late October?

Well, here we now are, in one of the liberal, elite capitals of America—not “real America,” in the eyes of a certain Veep candidate—and the Obamania is palpable. SF is plastered in Obama posters and it all amounts to preaching to the converted, but it also gets one’s spirits up. I realized the other day that I don’t think I’ve seen a McCain sticker, poster, T-shirt, anything—ever. If I lived in a battleground state, the Obama button I’m sporting on my purse would make more of a statement, but I might be subject to vandalism a la Peter Frampton, or worse—fall victim to a faux robbery attempt. (This election keeps getting weirder and weirder.)

I’m one of those Dems who refuses to give into the power of positive thinking, buoyed as it may be by the imperfect science of pollsters. There’s too much at stake to rest on those laurels. While all the Tina Fey-induced catharsis has helped, the anxiety has definitely been increasing. It’s seeping into my dreams. So I decided to do something, given that I have more free time on my hands: I’m volunteering for the campaign, spending hours at the phone bank.

During the shifts I’ve worked, the volunteers were given the softball assignments of calling people in SF who expressed interest in volunteering for the campaign, and of calling absentee-ballot voters in OH who already pledged support for Obama (“Don’t forget to mail your ballot today!”). No arguing with angry Republicans, no strained conversations with those who believe Barack is a terrorist, no waxing poetic to the undecideds. And though it’s been like shooting fish in a barrel, the experience has provided me with moments—just a handful of small moments—that make me so glad to be back in America during these last crucial days:

- The 84-year-old man who adorably responded, “My, yes, dearie” when I asked him if he’d already sent off his ballot, and followed it with, “If those two [McCain and Palin] make it into the White House, I don’t know what I’ll do.”
- The elderly woman who told me that her sister had never voted in her life and was now casting her first ever ballot.
- The man in San Francisco who was worried that because he wasn’t a citizen, he wouldn’t be able to help the campaign’s volunteer efforts. When I told him that anyone could help, he exclaimed enthusiastically, “Anything for Barack! Anything!”
- Looking around the phone bank, smiling at the people around me, and feeling inspired by the community rallying around this important common cause. I’m proud of all the passion this election has inspired and how it’s drawn out record numbers of voter registrations. Even if the election results are not the ones I personally want, and despite all the usual BS and newfound levels of crazy seen this year, I’m still heartened by the energy and interest in the political process this election has evoked.

My husband has long since abandoned his ostrich-like resistance to election chatter—it’s impossible to hide from it. And we’ll both be at the phone bank, quelling our anxiety in small bursts before the Big Day arrives.