Voting with a child

I just got back from voting. I couldn't sleep last night. I woke up with a source of nervous energy. The interesting thing....my daughter actually woke up before I did.

For the last few weeks, she's been keenly aware of the elections. In fact, her classmates were discussing "who" they were voting for. I thought this was interesting. I'm not sure if it's due to our proximity to D.C. or if children every where are keen about the elections.

Since our daughter seemed so interested, we agreed that she could come with one of us to go vote. While driving to the polling station, there was a radio ad for Barack Obama, and my daughter said "That sounds like Barack." Again, I am so surprised how much she can differentiate between the candidates.

We discussed that once we were in line, we probably shouldn't voice who we are voting for. I told her that voting is a very personal matter, and other people may not be voting for the same person. She totally got that.

We passed cars with McCain bumper stickers, and she counted them along the way. She also counted Obama bumper stickers as well.

The line wasn't horribly long, but we did end up waiting for 30 minutes (and I got there around 6:55am). The person in front of us is originally from Trinidad, and the person behind us is originally from Honduras, and I'm originally from Vietnam. My daughter asked us why we were allowed to vote since none of us were born in the U.S. I told her even if we were not born in the U.S., we all became U.S. citizens and are priviledged enough to vote. It was an interesting history lesson, and my daughter really enjoyed talking to our fellow voters.

When we finally got to our poll booth, my daughter quietly watched me vote. I had a flashback of my own childhood...going to vote with my parents. That left an impression on me. The importance of a vote, and I hope today left an impression on my daughter as well.

I guess it has....she asked me when she can start voting. I told her when she turned 18 years old.

We left hand in hand, but not before buying $10 worth of baked goods and coffee.