Voting only takes a moment no matter what the system
It would take more than a little rain and a tight parking lot to keep me from casting my vote, so a new voting system wasn't going to slow me down either.
I walked the gauntlet of mostly enthusiastic candidate supporters and confidently entered the Middlesex Township municipal building to join the line of voters waiting to sign in.
So far, so good.
However, I will admit a moment of doubt when I was handed a large, cream-colored folder with my ballot inside. There was no time to panic though, as a poll worker smiled and told me to read the instructions carefully and call her if I had any questions.
She calmly pointed to a selection of tables with three-sectioned privacy screens.
I plopped down by another woman at what felt like a school desk and chair and opened the folder.
Checking the instructions, I found I was given the appropriate colored pen and started examining each race. As I hunched over and colored in the ovals by my chosen candidate's name, there were flashbacks to taking the SATs. Then it hit me, what if I made a mistake?
Looking up, pasted on the divider was the answer. Cross out the error with an “X” and fill in the correct oval.
Careful to fill out both sides of the ballot, I then looked around and saw the machine that was to scan my finished ballot. There was another moment of doubt.
My vote is private, I didn't want to take it out of the folder.
“Face up,” the friendly poll worker told me.
Moment of truth. Then moment of panic. “Face up?”
I just quickly fed the ballot into the machine. It just went in — no lights flashed, no buzzer went off, nothing came out the other side.
“Face up?”
“You must have done it right, it went in,” she pointed out.
And that was that, another completion of my civic duty, executing my right and privilege as an American citizen.
I grabbed an “I VOTED” sticker on my way out into the rain.
What difference did the paper ballot voting make on this voter? Sitting instead of standing. Coloring ovals instead of using a flip book and magic pen to mark your selections. Not much, really.
However, I guess have to admit I missed pushing the VOTE button on the electronic system and watching the light go off. But, hey, if filling out a paper ballot keeps our voting system safer, it's a small price to pay.
Donna Sybert is associate managing editor of the Butler Eagle.
