It’s voting day again, and I miss America.
I remember casting my first ballot. I turned eighteen just in time for what I thought would be the most consequential election in American history. On June 7, 2016, I voted for Hillary Rodham Clinton in the primary elections of California, and I was so excited to vote that the poll volunteer literally accused me of electioneering — standing too close to the voting booth and campaigning, which is illegal in America.
That year was wild: the absolute exhilaration of graduating high school and the bliss of doing exactly what I thought I would do for the rest of my life … then the confusion of who I was and what I should do and think and …
Eight years later, I still find myself occasionally longing for the certainty and conviction of being eighteen, longing for the version of America that existed in my head when I was eighteen.
I’m not in America right now, but all the same, I voted in the place I always have: my hometown of Saratoga, California.
Now, in the UK, I feel strangely removed from America from an intellectual and geographic level, yet still my body is anxious. I feel this urge to throw up when I think about what’s next, and the anticipation is literally fueling me to finish my term paper nearly four days in advance (unheard of for the likes of me).
Voting this year felt like an obligation, a burden honestly. My friends who didn’t want to vote before, I suppose I get it a bit more. Part of me thinks in jest: my vote should just be beamed up from an AI indexed to my values. These propositions require endless reading for extraordinarily annoying politicking, and these politicians and people haven’t made me fall in love. I’m not in love.
I’ve been thinking about responsibility and reciprocity. Responsibility towards an unknown larger world is difficult — what do we owe each other societally? Responsibility towards the idea of democracy too — what do I owe the structures that surround me? But reciprocity seems easier, that perhaps we can give and receive, and find balance and belonging. In the love that we have for each other, we perform already these extraordinary acts for the world at large.
Like Seneca, I write this not for the many, but for you. Each of us is enough of an audience for the other.
I ask you to vote, for me, actually. Just to make me feel better.
Love,
Shannon
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Here’s a great voter guide website for SF and California propositions more broadly, made by a great friend Peter Darche. I recommend Josh’s guide for some awesome and in-depth analysis. My votes here.