Note: This is NOT a political ad nor does it bash anyone.
😀 But it won’t matter anyway since 2022 voting is over. 😀
I don’t know about you but for me voting season . . . yuk! 😩
Every voting year the commercials and game ads are filled with candidate ads. From “vote for me, I’m this or that” to “so-and-so lied, cheated, caused a scandal, or gave up principles to get more funding for their state”. And the list goes on. News stories are sometimes presented to be more one-sided. They can even be racially, gender, ethical, and religion sided.
Yet, every 2 years, I push myself to go out and vote. Because, it’s a free right I have. And, I believe voices matter.
Then there’s Facebook, other platforms, and just plain communicating with people. Friends arguing! Christians arguing! Family arguing!
I mean, SERIOUSLY!
Two years ago and today, I was able to take our son with because we homeschool. We took advantage of it and asked questions along the way. From verifying our identification to filling out a ballot correctly/neatly and to watching the ballot machine as it finished “eating” our ballot.
Okay, so I gotta share a funny.
Where we live, we vote in the gym of a local school. The entire time in the gym there was a noise over by the ballot counting machine. I thought there was an update to how the voting process works. But, I stayed focused on my son and educating him on proper procedures.
That noise kept annoying me though.
Then I started thinking that all of the chaos of the voting season may have just caught up with me.
Finally at the private ballot cubicle, I decided I’m sure that I’ve figured out what that noise is.
Focusing on continuing to educate my son, I meticulously worked on filling in those ovals and made sure he understood the importance of doing it correctly for voting and tests that he would encounter.
Done!
We mosey on over and wait in line to put the ballot into the machine.
And that noise was even louder!!
Educating my son again, I explained what we were about to do with the ballot. I also finished it by saying, “They must have made some changes to the machine. Apparently it now shreds the ballots.” And we were immediately told it was our turn.
Now to focus on placing it into the machine and wait for the counter to change over from number 445 to 446.
To my dismay, the gal helping at the machine heard what I told my son and said, “No! It doesn’t shred them. That noise is from the air duct up there.” I looked up to what she pointed to and sure enough about 4-5 feet above the ballot machine on the wall there really was a large air duct.
Can you say, embarrassing? (Hence, this story is in a red block.)
If I did wear hats, this would have been an appropriate time to pull that large brim, down!
Yep! True story.
The entire time in the gym I had been thinking it was a shredder over by the ballot machine. Yet, no shredder in sight. Well, it had to be IN the machine. And yet again, part of my brain was thinking they can’t shred ballots because of possible recounts.
That’s exactly what the gal mentioned after looking back towards us from looking up at that air duct.
I tried to recover by saying, “I didn’t think they shred them but the noise sounded like it was the machine.”
We each received our voting stickers and I walked out of the gym saying to my son, “Oh my gosh! That stupid air duct. They really need to fix it.”
So I’ve spent several moments on and off today thinking about that.
I remind myself that it at least brought a smile to her face.
Go ahead! Have a laugh! 😂🤣 I am too now.
Back to my original purpose in writing.
In voting years past, one side was not allowed to speak up against the other side. But the other side gave themselves permission to bash, scold, ridicule, and speak so demeaning to the one side that it seemed they wanted the one side to be wiped out, sent to a remote island, or at the minimum possibly jailed.
The worst seems to come out in everyone. That includes the bashing that opponents do to each other. Tearing each other down to NOTHING! The scum of the earth! Then after the election they put on a happy face to “work together” again.
I seriously hate the change we see in people during voting season.
Maybe this was only happening in our neck of the country.
Maybe some of our friends, family, and church family were the only ones doing this.
Maybe it was our fault and we needed to be corrected.
Maybe! Maybe! Maybe! Oh, the things that run through our minds!
So, this year was going to be different.
- We didn’t watch the news. We hardly do anyway.
- We get the weather on a weather app.
- We quickly mute the tv during commercials.
- We did complain, only in our home, about all the trees being cut down to grace our mailbox daily with political posters of various sizes.
- We got frustrated with the barrage of unsolicited texts on our phones.
- This year, there was only a couple emails.
- We used it as an educational purpose for our son to remind him that people can have their own opinion even if it’s different from ours.
I felt I had prepared myself pretty well. We finished homeschool. I put my Lavender essential oil on and took a good whiff. Didn’t have to stand in a line outside this year. Was well pleased with the checking-in process this year and validating we are real people.
I was fully prepared to have “joy” in the voting process this year.
And then . . .
So I not only looked at it differently, I decided I was choosing peace instead of frustration.
And I’m okay with a little embarrassment if it brought JOY to someone else.
It’s also brought me a true peace throughout a ‘typically frustrating and wishing it away’ day.
For you friends, I hope you can look back on election day and find something that helps you get your joy back! Even if it’s just the fact that your choice of candidates was elected.
If nothing comes to mind, take a moment to laugh about my shredder story! 😂
For more information about CPTG Certified Pure Tested Grade™ Lavender essential oil, you can read more here.
Getting My Joy Back 