Voting with baby

Since tomorrow is election day and lots of my fellow Georgians will probably be stuck standing in line for hours, I just wanted to take a moment to gloat. I voted last week! In fact, on Thursday afternoon, I went down to the early voting spot for my district, which is a building in downtown Decatur, and I was in and out in under half an hour. Of course, the line was supposed to be two and a half hours, but after about twenty minutes of waiting, a glorious woman carrying a baby came over and told me that she had heard that anyone with a baby could go through a side door and vote right away. I was a little nervous to lose my spot in line, but I figured it was worth a shot. I sheepishly followed her in pushing Roxanne in her umbrella stroller, and to my shock, we were admitted through a side door and told to wait in some big comfy easy chairs at some tables. Then we could sit while we filled out our voting forms, and hand our ID and completed forms to some lovely poll workers, and wait to be called for our turn to vote, which took under ten minutes. It was fantastic!

The next day (Halloween) my husband left work early to try and vote, and when he arrived at the building, he was told it would be a three and a half hour wait. He called me, and I suggested that he wander around downtown Decatur until I got off work and then use Roxanne to cheat the line. Turns out I got off a little early, and we met at Dancing Goats (delicious delicious coffee) to make the baby swap. It all felt mildly shameful and suspicious, and on some level, we were convinced that one of the employees would recognize Roxanne, or our bright orange stroller, and accuse Justin of cheating and kick him out immediately. Obviously, this did not happen, and Justin was able to vote pretty quickly. Of course, Roxanne threw a fit while he was trying to decipher all of the endless choices for positions he had never heard of, and he ended up tearing his shirt while retrieving a toy that she threw across the room. I got to spend almost an entire half hour by myself at Dancing Goats, sitting outside with a magazine and sipping a Pistachio White Mocha Latte. I called my mom and gossiped with her. It was heavenly.

So yes, I think those 13 hours of labor were worth it. I mean, the baby is nice, too, but this whole convenient voting thing is awesome.