The early voters arrived at their polling place in a clatter of skateboard wheels and excited chatter.
Tucking their boards under their arms, they nodded to election judge Beatrice Owen and headed in to cast their vote.
It was a small moment, but it made her smile. She holds on to the memory, one of her favorite Election Day recollections, during the long days she and other members of the League of Women Voters spend registering voters and the even longer nights at candidate forums for lesser-known races you have to flip your ballot over to see.
“This is your country,” said Owen, president of the League of Women Voters of St. Paul. Voting, she said, is a responsibility and a civic duty.
In an election cycle churning with anxiety, stress and rage, Owen still sees Minnesotans approaching the ballot box with all the hope and enthusiasm of a first-time voter on a skateboard.
“I think, overall, people are kind of excited,” she said. Excited enough to research the constitutional amendments on this year’s ballot, excited enough to read up on the down-ballot judicial candidates, excited enough to walk up to a League of Women Voters booth at an event and learn more. “It’s like they’re saying ‘I’m taking responsibility for my country.’ I think that reflects in a positive, upbeat attitude.”
Hearing about positive, upbeat voters is a pleasant change from news of a stressed-out, doomscrolling electorate lying awake at night wondering what is going to happen to those of us on Donald Trump’s ever-growing enemies list.
The 2024 presidential election is tying us in knots. The American Psychological Association’s annual Stress in America report finds a stressed, anxious nation where politics is fraying families and fueling fears about the nation’s very future.
