I’m a little late with the post, but figured it was worth it. In trying to be an example of a responsible citizen, I drove down to Thompsons Station Tuesday morning to vote. We recently moved to Arrington, but my voter registration still said Thompsons Station, so I figured that was my best bet. When I get there, I had to wait in line for about 30 minutes in order to fill out a piece of paper and show my ID. This was supposed to be the line that helped you figure out if you were in the right place. So I filled the paper out with my new address, an explained to the volunteer that I had moved recently. Simple enough it seems. She said not problem, and pointed me to “Station 2” where I signed the book… once again, I explained that I had moved, and they still had my old address. “No problem… just sign here.”

At this point, I go get in the actual “vote line” which takes about an hour and fifteen minutes. Worth it I guess for my voice to be heard, and so I can get the little “I voted” sticker. Here’s where it becomes tough to keep my calm. Just as the lady is setting up the machine for me to vote, she notices “Arrington” on my white paper. “I’m not sure if you can vote here”, she tells me. I try not to get too upset, and explain that I was very clear with everyone so far that I had moved, in hopes that I could avoid any trouble. To make a long story short, after a call to the Voting Commission, I am told that I need to go to Triune to vote. I’m obviously not very happy because I just wasted 2 hours, am late for a meeting, and because everyone is a volunteer, I really don’t have anyone to express my displeasure with adequately.

At this point, I decide it isn’t worth it and go to work. After work, I get home and Kylie is cooking dinner. Angie hears about my experience, and encourages me to go to Triune to try and vote before the 7PM cutoff. I reluctantly agree, but in the end I am glad that I did. The folks over at Triune Baptist Church were very nice, the line was reasonable, and I was back at the house in 45 minutes. That’s not even taking into account that I accomplished my original goals of being a good citizen and not one of those hypocritical complainers that doesn’t vote. I’m glad I did, since given the results, I could easily have fallen into that trap.

I remember hearing a guy at the voting center say that Triune had better than 80% turnout. That’s tremendous. The overall turnout for the country was somewhere over 40%. I still think that if they want to get everyone out, they should make voting a holiday. While they are at it, we should make Monday’s and Friday’s holidays as well.