Walking backwards and keeping strong

I thought I would, I knew I would. Everything about me said I would.

I did not.

I did NOT vote.

I know, I KNOW.

I went there. Well, I went within a mile. I intended to exercise my voice, speak my freedom, my belief of, well, my beliefs. But when I took a right on the street that leads to the school, I realized how much my single vote had to do with my heart and how much the big bad world.

On scale of said world, not much.

My teeny-tiny life is not city-wide, state-wide or even country-wide. Forget the worldwide repercussions of that. To me, it's much larger than the enormity of now, the expanse of borders. It's about my broken heart. It's realizing that one single line could turn me upside down. One single line in a sign-in sheet in a single school cafeteria in a single voting district. One.

I couldn't do it. I could not face his name present, or his name absent. My father, understand, is not here. I did not, I do not, want to see his name and have the voter registered reminder that he's not here. I already know. And I did not want to experience the absence of his name and be reminded in a way that would scream to me that his death has reached the details. His name, present or absent, is still ever-present to me. If you think that's circular, then you are here-and-now blessed with the in-the-flesh presence of someone you love.

Later in the day when I could still vote but knew there was no way I was going to face that particular monster, when I knew I should but didn't feel bad and therefore was wondering what was wrong with me because surely anyone who is breathing and has at least a single opinion floating across their brain would go out and vote, and if they didn't should at least be made to make amends by being forced to listening to the Paris Hilton's CD while picking up discarded political signs throughout my neighborhood, well, after a sentence like that, I have to breathe. Pause. But my point is that later in my day, I heard some supporting words. Granted, I pay him to support me, but it's deeply validating to hear that when you've been doing well, feeling strong, regaining your personal power, that it's best that you preserve that and not provoke situations, that it's best that the decisions you make are in your best interest.

I scribbled his words in my notebook. To me, it was a permission slip I've worked long and hard to earn. Still, from the time I've first been permitted to vote, I've done so. My father today would be disappointed in my choice. I'm wrestling that within, this emotional and passive response I've coughed up today.

I believe that whatever I do is based on the lessons he taught, even those he would not have supported.

And so it is.

Let's go back to the cafeteria. Did I mention in my previous post that after lunch we were given 15 minutes to rest our weary little heads before returning to our lessons?

Right now, I would like a carpet square to sleep upon and awake later in the day to see what other people have decided for me.

Some of you, a few of you, I'm sure you understand. The few who do not? With all my heart I say to you that I'm so sorry that one day you will.