Vote.

"Throw dirt on me/ and grow a wildflower" ~ Lil Wayne.

I'm crushed this day after election day.  My I Voted sticker is on my bathroom counter, sad and losing its glue.  I won't go too much into politics here issue by issue, but I can say, with unequivocal disgust, what an embarrassment it is that only 25% of people in Arizona voted in this election. 

I walked into my house last night, weary from 3.5 hours of sleep due to writing an American Romanticim paper until 4am, waking up at 7:15am to finish up a fiction piece for my Literary Magazines class, left my house by 8am to drive 45 minutes away to vote in my district, then drove back to work an 8 hour day.  I walked through my house door with my work clothes heavy on my skin but my I Voted sticker grinning from my shirt.  

My roommates were sitting together on the couches peering at me like cheap entertainment as I walked up the stairs into the living room.  "You voted?" one of my roommates asked me incredulous.  "Of course I did," I said sharply.  "Why?" he continued in a sarcastic voice to the amusement of the crowd of my roommates.  "Because it's important," I answered matter-of-factly. "To who?" "To me," I answered simply.

I was getting annoyed.   Another one of my roommates said that voting doesn't matter since so many of the issues win by huge majorities.  "Sure," I said, "sometimes some issues are pretty fixed, but not always.  Sometimes it comes down to the wire and every vote does matters."  There was grumbling among things and more snide remarks, but the cynicism wasn't boding well with my sleep-deprived body.  "I'm glad that I voted.  I'm proud of myself."  I walked up the stairs without bothering with anyone's counter-remarks.

An issue everyone in the house cared about lost by 5,500 votes.  Every vote mattered.  Every vote counted.