Casting my vote...

Dear Diary,

Yesterday I cast my vote for president...the first time I voted early.  When I was marking my ballot I was channeling my grandmother..."This vote is for you Gram!"  How she would have loved to vote for a woman for president!  My grandmother didn't get the right to vote until she was 29 and voted in her first presidential election in 1920, Harding vs Cox. 

I don't think my grandmother was a card carrying suffragette but I know she took her vote very seriously and never missed an election until she got quite old.  My first presidential election was in 1972, McGovern vs Nixon.  I haven't missed on since.  The voting age was lowered to 18 in 1971, something so many of us fought so hard for because of the Viet Nam war.   "Old enough to die for your country but not old enough to vote for those who will send you to die." was our battle cry.  I turned 21 in 1970.

Voting is the most sacred obligation of citizenship.  Women struggled for decades to finally win the right to cast their ballots and, for me, this election is the most important one in my lifetime.  It isn't just about who will govern for the next four years.  It is about the very soul of our country and who we are as a people.  It doesn't get more important than that.