A pinch of chad for good luck
My lucky pinch of chad
On Voting Day, Karen and I went early to our local precinct at a nearby elementary school. The polling station was in the library. We waited in line amidst the shelves of American Girl and Hardy Boys books, and eventually presented ourselves to some very nice senior citizen volunteers. They carefully and thoroughly (and slowly) cross-checked our names and address and then gave us our old-style ballots, the kind with pre-perforated little rectangles — chad!
I was very pleased to be using chad-based ballots, and after I carefully poked out my choices for the significant (President) to the confusing (Indian gaming) to the mundane (property tax), I noticed that there was a healthy amount of chad that had accumulated at the bottom of the voting machine from this and past elections. They were the many different colors of ballots long cast — pink, green, blue. I was so fascinated with them that I took a pinch of them for good luck! I made them a little pouch out of an old Safeway receipt I found in my wallet. I’ve kept them there ever since. I’ve taken them out now and again to give them some air and show them to a few people. Mostly the reaction is the same as mine was — nostalgic affection.
To me, the chad represent the anonymity of punch-card ballots. They comfort me that at least for this time, and for perhaps the last time, my ballot was secret.