Day 195: Working the Polls.

I don't read many other blogs, but there's one I follow in which the writer (she comments here as molly) frequently wears her liberal heart on her political sleeve. I always feel vaguely lame when I read her impassioned pleas for people to get up off their asses and get involved, which is partly what prompted me to state (in this blog) that I would say kaiten! to my pattern of political laziness.

The answer came when I read something about how nobody wants to be a pollworker anymore. (Really? People don't want to earn $55 for 14 hours of work? No way ...) I impulsively made the call, and was then genuinely shocked when someone from the Election Board actually called me back. I procrastinated and stalled - unwilling to make a commitment - but knew deep down that I had no choice.

Before I knew it, the weekend before election day had arrived, and I found myself sitting in a Compton church getting my 90 minutes of required pollworker training.

And then came today: election day. I arrived at the voting precinct (a community rec center five blocks from my house) just after 6:30 a.m., one of four pollworkers. None of us had ever done it before, which made us all nervous. I was given (okay, volunteered for) the job of signing in the voters. I greeted them with a friendly (but never perky) "Hello," found their names on the roster, and showed them where to sign. Since it was a primary election, voters splashed their "Inka dots" along registered party lines.

My three co-pollsters sit at our table while two voters do their thing.

This went on for 13 hours ... and only 181 people came in to vote. Since most of them came before or after work, the day felt very, very long and very, very boring.

That's not to say it wasn't kind of fun. We were a good team and got along well, and there's already been talk of getting the band back together for the November election.

Here are some facts and highlights from my day:

1. Basic Stats: Of the 161 people in my neighborhood who voted (630 were registered), 120 hit the Democratic booth, 24 chose the Non-Partisan line, 13 went Republican, 2 were Greenies and 2 were American Independents. Six people changed their affiliation to Democrat after arriving. No one turned Republican.

2. Neighborhood Factoid: There are 32 registered voters named Rodriguez in my hood, 10 of whom voted. That means the Rodriguez name alone was responsible for 6.21% of my precinct's results. Add in the Hernandez and Lopez voters and that number jumps to 12.42%.

3. Best Moment of the Day: When a father who was a registered Democrat happened to see that his son (on the line below him) had registered as a Republican, he shook his head and muttered "Jesus Christ" before heading to his booth.

4. Worst Moments of the Day: The bastards brought donuts. Twice. I resisted. It sucked.

5. Weirdest Voter Award: The man pictured below asked me to look him up in the voter roll as "God's Gift to Women." He was serious about this for far, far too long. I drew the line when he began to pull up his jeans to show me his legs.

6. Strangest Comment: When a short, slim woman stepped up to sign in, her five-year-old daughter looked me in the eye and said (quite seriously), "My Mom is small."

7. Silliest Boredom Alleviator: During the height of the slow times, one of my fellow pollworkers (Jillian, who ruined my status as both the youngest worker and the only white person) became so bored she began rounding off the "I Voted" stickers and arranging them into various flower patterns.

I finally walked out of the polling place at 8:45 p.m., and I have to say, I felt pretty good about the whole thing. I had, for once, actually contributed to the process. Kaiten!

That said, I'm a little relieved that there are five months until the next election.

Okay ... more than a little.