November 7, 2004

  • Swing state life

    My mom told me today that as Ohio voters, she and my father got a
    ridiculous amount of attention in the month prior to the election. They
    averaged five phone calls every day, mostly from Bush, of which a
    little more than half were actual people rather than recordings. They were also the lucky
    recipients of (on three separate occasions) large manila envelopes
    containing smiling color portraits of the First Couple.

    And one day my mother received a call from a high school
    acquaintance who was ranting about the evils of the Bush
    administration. They had not spoken in forty years, so the phone call was a little out of the blue.

    Mom: She talked to me for over an hour.
    Me: I can't believe you talked to her for all that time.
    Mom: Well, I have a nice, warm heart. So I couldn't say what I wanted to say: "hey, shut up!"

    Actually, she said, "So I couldn't say, 'hey, shut up!' " But I like my version better.

    My mom voted for Kerry, as did I. But sadly, after all the money Kerry
    and Bush spent on my dad, he was fed up with them both. So he threw his
    vote away on an independent candidate.

    My mom also told me about the proposal to amend the Ohio Constitution to ban gay marriage, which passed overwhelmingly.

    Mom: I voted against the ban.
    Me: Mom, you're so progressive!
    Mom: Yes, well, gay people aren't hurting anyone. And scientists say that they are predisposed to it. So I say, okay.

    Me: (with mock sincerity) Mom, I want to marry a man. Is that okay?

    Mom: (quickly) No, not you!

Comments (6)

  • I'm still upset that 3 million voters in Massachusetts cost Joe Lieberman the state.

  • haha. it's funny how you explained "with mock sincerity" to make sure we understand that you didn't really mean what you said.

    you voted for kerry? why? but then again, why not? yeah, it's over...

  • Um, yeah. Well, I wanted to be sure there was no misunderstanding. It's better to make things clear early on than to have awkward conversations down the line.

    Yes, I voted for Kerry. My politics are slightly left of center. And I wasn't happy with the Bush administration's decision to go to war in Iraq.

  • Warm heart? Mom tells me to shut up all the time.

  • D'oh.

  • While in Florida during the holidays in December 2004, I showed my dad this blog post, and he laughed at the last exchange. "That shows Mom's hypocrisy," he said.

    My dad considered me to be a serious boy, so I was really happy that he appreciated my sense of humor in this instance.

    In his later years, I gave him a link to my blog, hoping to be understood.

    He emailed me back: "I read your blog. It was pretty funny, but I don't think I would ever write anything like that."

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