Why I Didn't Vote

It wasn't because I couldn't.

I'm not a felon. I'm not an illegal alien. I'm not sick or overseas with absentee ballot issues. I haven't moved recently and forgotten to update my info. I have three kids - one a newborn - but that doesn't keep me from dragging them to places of importance like the grocery store or the library or church. I don't work such exhausting and difficult hours for an unpatriotic boss that there was no way I could make it to the polls at any of the available times.

It wasn't because I didn't want to.

I felt so grown up the first time I voted. I take it seriously. My first election cycles were hotly contested, one was the infamous counting fiasco when I went to bed sick with anxiety and woke up to no relief for weeks as the results were finalized. I've worn my sticker for days and kept my very first one in my memory book.

It wasn't because I am apathetic.

I know my vote matters. I know countless lives and blood have been given to win and preserve my freedom and right to elect my rulers, and to have a say in the laws. Millions in the world have neither guaranteed right nor ability nor accessibility to participate in their countries government. I know that the results will never deliver utopia, will never deliver moral salvation, and will not be enough alone to shift the greater culture, but they still do a lot. It's not just the Federal level that's important either. I've served as an election judge several times and worked in my local office with dedication and patriotic enthusiasm.

It was because I was utterly uninformed. 

Utterly.

Uninformed.

I didn't know who was running. I didn't even know who was incumbent.

I didn't know what anyone stood for, had heard no speeches, been to no town meetings. I didn't know what issues were on the ballot or even what races. It's my own fault.

See, politics has gotten so reactive, it seems to me. Facebook is a virtual tumult of nasty insinuations, character attacks, and baiting headlines. Mass media is just that: massive. I had long ago stopped subscribing to hubbub. When the occasional outrage showed up in the feed and I actually followed the link, I found what appeared to be sensationalist writings consisting mostly of presumption, sound-bites, and strutting.

I don't receive news magazines anymore. I don't get the paper. I don't have and don't watch television. Mostly bc I choose not to afford those things in favor of other stuff like healthy groceries. Which means the internet and conversations with friends is my only source. But I don't talk politics much, because most times it's so inflammatory. And the internet.... well...

So I didn't vote. Because my 'voice' this go around would have been nothing more than gambling. Honestly I could have taken dice with me, to vote 'by lots', and been just as likely to make choices that actually reflect my positions. (not an entirely bad idea, though, it'd be biblical, haha)

And I learned my lesson. No, not because of who won, I'm still utterly ignorant. But because nothing happened. No one is pounding down my door. No soldiers are giving me the cold shoulder. My kids aren't ashamed to show their faces with me. And whatever the results are, I'm fairly sure that the outcomes aren't going to immediately threaten my security or my finances or my children's future. 

Nothing happened. I didn't vote... and no one 'cares'. So if I don't honor my rights, if I don't take the responsibility to inform myself, if I don't follow through on my convictions, no one is going to make me. And that's how rights get lost.

Next time, "God-willing and the crik don't rise", I will be better. I will be informed. And I will vote.