Be the change you want to see.

and I swear I am going to actually share this information with the county polling officers.

...for those who don't know, both other times I've volunteered at a polling station: I received, at the end of the day, forms to fill out about the other folks I volunteered with. Feedback forms. They normally get filed into the same envelope that holds the voter registration forms, any forms for people who are interested in applying to be pollworkers themselves... and maybe one other form? I think the purple/lavender form for voters to log complaints/suggestions.

Okay, that said, yesterday working with P. was bad enough that I was *looking for those feedback forms* and never found them. nor did I get any response from P when I asked her "do we have the pollworker feedback forms?" beyond a blink, a short stare, and then looking away from me.

P was the "precinct inspector" which means that she's supposed to be the most knowledgeable/experienced person volunteering, which by extension I've always figured, means they're the person who can answer questions or will take on the responsibility of making sure everything goes as smoothly as possible.

the *least offensive* of my complaints about P is that she really didn't know her stuff. And she didn't make the effort to do any of the research that would have brought the answers up. Like OH look the thing up in the binder that's PROVIDED FOR POLLWORKERS that has all the protocols, check lists, manuals and handbooks.

okay. so now I'm getting pissed off remembering this, and I'm gonna just make a list.

Our polling station was at the local high school, and for the first time, I had teenagers working along with me behind the table. They were good eggs, all three of them. I feel bad that I can't remember the name of the third boy, the first two were Ben and Mateo. (Oh i know why I remember their names, I made their nametags for them.)

okay so these boys take to the necessary record keeping like ducks to water. They were SO polite and just kind??? to everyone and they were just ON IT. You know?

Here's some of the bologna P. was putting into the world. (I'm a writer and I couldn't make this shit up)

• she tells each of the boys, repeatedly, stories about serial killers. One I heard her tell at least twice about how sensitive Ted Bundy was, how horrifically physically abusive his parents and grandparents were in EXPLICIT DETAIL
  
• she's talking about other serial killers and how she's convinced that as a self taught researcher, she could heal them.
  
• she starts digging into the Stanford rapist story and retelling it in all its gory details including the shittiness of the rapist's dad trying to argue he shouldn't have to register as a sex offender, to the degree that I had to say out loud several times in a row "no, no, no, stop it now, please, I can't listen to this, I must have a more cheerful topic of conversation" because she COULDN'T READ MY DISCOMFORT AT ALL OR ELSE DIDN'T CARE
  
• I must say I'm awfully fucking proud of the fact that I didn't curse at all around the boys or the voters, especially given P's repeated provocation.
  
• P hadn't read any of the propositions or any of the candidate statements, she said, because she liked to "make decisions on the fly". That's just annoying, not offensive, unless you consider that the precinct inspector is intentionally keeping herself ignorant? It was troubling.
  
• Also troubling was that she came out as a trump supporter. Like she says she loves how he got in a reporter's face and told him to shut up. She was giggling as she recounted it. In the polling station.
  
• *inhale* *exhale*
  
• Her inability to stop talking when someone else was uncomfortable made those boys' shoulders round forward and in. One escaped into a novel he's reading for English class. One stared into space. The third one just had that uncomfortable smile on his face.
  
• She DIDN'T DO HER JOB. The only time she worked at the table was during the few moments where we had enough varied people who needed help that, for example, I'd get up from the table to help someone find their polling place on the map. She LITERALLY sat there telling her awful stories and watching the teenagers do all the work. And me. I was also doing all the work.
  
• She called the managing inspector who has 8 precincts to supervise, and got him to set up the polling computer (we only have one, it's meant to assist voters who might need audio-visual assist in their voting) and also called him in to get him to take it down. Like, we could have done it, but with only two adults it would have been a pain. but we could have? only it felt to me, like she thought it was so much work.
  
• oh and okay while I'm at it, when I mentioned that I'm a writer, she said, "oh i always thought I could write a book" but then followed up with "but I don't like to write" and then a minute later, "yeah I don't like to read, I do love youtube videos though"
  
  
• and I'm STILL OFFENDED two days later
  
• I started going through the manual during the lull in voters a bit before lunchtime, started filling in the checklists so we could make sure we got all our stuff done for the day, reviewing the protocols and procedures for closing. Because I remembered the confusion at end of day and how everyone was rushing around trying to a) figure out what needed to be done and b) trying to figure out who would do what.
  
• no lying though, the managing inspector, Ronnie, was a GOOD GUY. He shared the basic information we'd need to close out the polling station, and helped us prioritize our tasks so hopefully we'd be ready when the courier crew arrived. He was super helpful.
  

I'm working on getting the feedback to my county office of voters. (conveniently, as I mentioned above, P. failed to pass out the feedback forms that I've always gotten before from my polling supervisors.)

I phoned into the Election Officer Hotline and basically lodged a complaint but I think I'm going to have to go down myself to get ahold of the polling supervisors' feedback form and fill it out. This here should help with detail

...and now I have that knot back under my shoulder blade that I always get when I a) am frustrated and b) have spent a lot of time at the keyboard.



comforting thought: the boys were VERY clear-eyed about things, I think, and could probably tell for themselves that P was full of shit. And just unprofessional as fuck.

I wish I'd done a better job of *protecting* them from her FLAT OUT BOLOGNA (oh yeah, she also claimed to know how to operate a CAT scanner and that she could tell "if you were violent, if you were lying, just by what part of the brain lit up" which, fair, probably CAT scans can DO that, I'm just disbelieving that SHE could do that, because of the rest of the bologna she was shoveling.)

but I never in a million years would have expected this kind of awfulness from a pollworker, to be honest.
Everyone else I've worked this gig with was kind, completely professional, had a good sense of social boundaries, and were committed to trying to do as good a job as they possibly could.

The day was far from a total waste, I feel like I did solid work and had tons of positive interactions, but I ... if I was in those boys' shoes, I doubt I would ever volunteer to do that again, for fear of having that kind of precinct inspector again.

I've decided I can run a precinct myself next time and do ten times as good a job as P. did. Not a doubt in my mind.

I'm gonna sign up to run a precinct.

kinda feeling crappy about the world and my role in it.

last post about remembering that I have power? yeah. I have to remember that i have power in order to make a thing happen.

BUT i have to decide what i WANT to happen, first.

things i want:

• to stop beating myself up
  
• to figure out what kind of job I am willing and wanting to do and how to get there
  
• to find some way of getting back out into the poly dating world
  
• to find other means of achieving intimacy than sex.

(Because it's INTIMACY in its varied form that i miss, even more than sex.)
and

• find some way of making the whole world suck less. Literally, the government OF THE USA has LOST 1475 children THAT WE KNOW OF only because 20 or so were recovered as part of a child sex slaves sting.


Okay.

This sort of thing in the news is exactly the kind of terrorism that is designed to make us all feel helpless.
but we are not helpless. And there is hope.

we are the hope we need to see in the world.

I don't know what are the answers to the things on the list, except generally. If I want intimacy, I need to spend time with my trusted people. Which means that I need to ASK FOR THAT.

If i want to stop beating myself up, I have to practice habits of self care. Which include getting the FUCK off the computer when thinking about the news is making my head explode from rage, like Anger in Inside Out.
FOOM!!!!

How can I make the world suck less? Do more of the encouraging things I already do, and think of other ways to be encouraging/supportive/helpful. To make more art. To write more.

Join the ACLU. I've been meaning to for awhile. Join the Freelancer's Union, maybe.

Use my privilege for good. I do try to do that. My friend N said I could be a "social engineer"... when i asked what that meant, it was explained that me being white and upper middle class meant that I could apply leverage in ways that other folks can't. I don't know how I learn to do that, or if the kinds of situations N was describing even fall under my ethics requirements. But I can research a little on it.

I need to come back to this list. I need to do it soon.