by Mke Covers
Even though we’re not choosing or renewing a President, Senator, House Representative, or even Pedro, Election Day is still this week. In such “off years,” this means that, all across the country, most ballots look like this:
Choices for Councilperson of the Council of Borough Counseling (pick only one):
Despite the ho-hum nature of Election Day 2023, people out there are still encouraging everyone (who politically agrees with them) to VOTE. The reason for this is simple: it is worth a LOT of points on social media. And even though this column isn’t tied to an Instagram account, I too encourage everyone reading to vote, regardless of party affiliation. I can comfortably say this because I know that most of the people in the political party that runs against my own cannot read or comprehend anything I’ve said so far.
Election time isn’t always smooth, however. I’d like to share the following actual encounter that I had in a recent state primary election that eroded what little faith I have left in any kind of political process. And that’s saying something, coming from an American citizen, where the referee at a Harlem Globetrotters game has more credibility than any given elected official.
I should have expected that I would encounter an idiotic poll worker when I went to vote. Again, I was voting in the United States, which is not a country renowned for its above-average IQs, unlike, say, Antarctica.
But this poll worker was dumbs. That’s not a typo, either. She was so dumb that it needed to be pluralized. Dumbs.
Maybe it was because I voted in June, which is a far cry from the hotbed of election activity that is November, when areas probably send their smartest people (meaning they are only dumb, not dumbs) to work the polls. I was voting in June not because I myself was confused about Election Day, but rather because it was the state primary. In case you’re unaware, a primary election basically means that, in most cases, you show up to vote for members of your own political party, almost all of whom are running unopposed in the party. However, while it lasts in this country, I will still exercise my right to vote, no matter what election it is. My forefathers fought, died, and/or avoided serving for my unique right to have a legitimate reason to leave work early on a random Tuesday afternoon.
Plus you get a sticker.
Anyway, for non-November elections, I can only assume that they really don’t care WHO shows up to work the polls, just as long as they are–or at least strongly resemble–any given life form on the planet, including bacteria. After all, poll work–in any month–is a strictly voluntary activity that offers no reward and just takes up time you can never get back, like jury duty or college. So it’s not like we have doctors, lawyers, or Antarctic residents lining up to offer their skills/body heat in the first place for such positions.
I arrived at my usual polling place, which is a senior recreational center. Once inside, I was guided to the person who would turn out to be the dumbest living being that I have met so far this year and began the voting process. She was an older woman who had likely cast her vote for James Garfield, both while he was running for President and also several times after, regardless of whether he was on the ballot or the mortal coil at the time. The look she wore was the same one people tend to wear after you have caught them eating expired glue that was NOT theirs to eat.
And this is who I had to give my name to.
“Mike Fenn,” I said, which is my name.
After staring blankly back at me for a few decades, she looked down at her thick voting ledger. She flipped through a few pages and must have realized that the voters are listed by typewritten name and not picture. So she was already behind.
“What was it?” she asked.
“Mike Fenn,” I repeated.
“Mike Senn?”
This is a common mistake. People occasionally mistake my surname of Fenn with “Senn.” Usually these people are on phone calls with very awful reception. I am used to repeating it, even though, in my four decades of life, I have never encountered another person with the last name “Senn.” For that matter, I have also not encountered too many people outside of family and Twin Peaks cast members with the last name “Fenn.” So it’s a draw.
“No, Fenn with an F. ‘F’ as in ‘Frank.’”
“OK, Frank Senn…”
I should have said “F, like fucking mroon.”
“Not Frank. F-E-N-N. First name is Mike.”
Her lone functioning brain cell sprang to its dim little life and she finally got the book with the “F” people listed. Naturally, she asked me to spell the monosyllabic, four-letter name yet again.
“Fenn,” I replied. “F-E-N-N.”
She ran her finger down the list of names, exhausting the hell out of her cranial cavity. She then looked back up at me.
“F-E-N-O? I? L?”
Seriously, she said this. She just started rattling off random letters at the end of my last name, as if I had only given her part of it.
“No, just F-E-N-N,” I repeated. I think there was a hint of exasperation in my voice at this point.
By this time, another poll worker had made her way over and, thankfully, assisted the moron. Chances are this wasn’t the first time she had seen her struggling with something as complex as a book of names that she had been privy to all day. Naturally, she didn’t find my last name anywhere. Apparently, my polling place had changed.
This was likely a result of gerrymandering. In case you are unaware, gerrymandering is when Republicans (occasionally Democrats, but usually only Republicans) somehow get the power to draw their own boundaries of voting districts. This results in zigzagged “districts” that contain nothing but older, white racists who always vote Republican, no matter what. When the government put districting into place long ago, they envisioned areas being divided up into equal segments with straight lines, resulting in districts that resembled squares, rectangles, and other such geometric shapes and, more importantly, contained a good mixture of the population. A gerrymandered district, on the other hand, more resembles the shape of a bolt of lightning. If Republicans who held the pens came across a house in which a mixed-race couple lived, they would draw the districting lines straight down the middle of their bed, ensuring that they obtained the white spouse’s side. To any semi-educated person (so, in other words, pretty much anyone except the poll worker I encountered), this hardly seems fair at all. But never you worry: if Republican gerrymandering ever gets too out of control, Democrats will rise up and give a very stern warning before continuing to do nothing to fight it.
Anyway, at this point, I was asked for my address so they could look up my voting place.
“1428 Elm Street,” I said. Needless to say, for purposes of this writing, this is not my real address, but rather a fake one designed to conceal my actual place of residence and also to make a horror movie reference.
“Your polling place is at Our Lady of Hope Parish,” the helpful, cerebellum-containing poll worker said.
“On Elm Street,” added her IQ-of-yarn colleague.
I think that, since “Elm Street” was the street that she just heard right now from me, she naturally assumed that this is where the polling place was located. I could have mentioned ANY place, including the local 7-Eleven or Mount Rushmore, and she would have claimed they were located on Elm Street.
Thankfully, I left the brain-dead poll worker behind and found my polling place, which was, as they specified, in a location that totally fell in line with rules governing separation of church and state (and was NOT anywhere NEAR Elm Street). I cast my vote for, among others, Bob Booger, and made my way back to Elm Street, my patriotic duty fulfilled for another election cycle.
More importantly, I got my sticker.
