Tuesday June 5 The aftermath

Primo just came home from the election coverage thingie. He is in shock. The Stripes incumbent governor is winning by 9 percentage points with 85% of the vote reported. The networks called the election at 30% of the vote reported, which I have to agree with Primo was irresponsible, especially considering that there were people still voting. The lines at the polls were so long that they had to stay open late.

"It's election fraud!" he said.

But then we looked at the election map online that showed results by county. "The Stripes guy won all those counties? I guess what that means is that people didn't want a recall election."

"Tamika voted for the independent candidate," I told him. She and I had talked about the election after our tennis class tonight.

Primo's jaw dropped. "How could she?"

I shrugged. "That's what she told me. She said she doesn't like either the Stripes or the Polka Dot guy. Says they're both crooks."

"But that just helped the Stripes guy!" he said.

"I don't know," I said. "Hey. I watched that TV station online for over an hour, waiting for you. You never showed up."

"When they called the election at 30%," he said, "it screwed up the coverage. So I never got on."

He opened the fridge and got out the hummus, then got some crackers from the cupboard.

"I didn't get to eat. The other table, with the Stripes people, got a foccacia. But I didn't get anything." He dragged a cracker through the hummus. "So the Stripes people were mostly nice, but this one lady was so stereotypical Stripes: she had bad teeth and lip gloss and she was gloating about [the Polka Dot candidate]."

"That doesn't help the Stripes cause," I said. "For them to have rude people."

"I can't believe it," he said. "Should I take it out on you?"

I punched him lightly in the arm. "Don't you dare. I voted for your guy, remember?* Just so I could have some peace in this house. This is not my fault."

He sighed. "Should I be despondent? Should I withdraw from the race?"

I thought about it. "You're allowed to be sad for a while. You've worked so hard on this. But I think you should run. I do. You might never have another chance."

He nodded. "I can think about it." He hugged me. "I have to go. I have to be with my peeps tonight."

I think tomorrow is going to be a very, very long day. I plan to be out of the house as much as possible. Primo is going to be cranky.

* Did I tell you about this? That I negotiated what was supposed to be a house free of political conversation in exchange for my voting for Primo's guy? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You can tell me how unprincipled I am when you're living with someone from the other side who wants to talk about politics all the time and you do not.