The Vote Boat (Or, The Choose Cruise)

There have been some more obvious and less obvious complications to life as a result of having recently moved three times in the space of three months. Of course getting people to help you move starts to become a challenge. Finding things around the neighborhood begins feeling as futile as it is difficult. The mail has more and more trouble finding you. Then there's something else which has to do with one's address changing a lot: voting registration.

I was surprised to find when an election came around after my first move that my registration had been updated along with my mailing address. This was nice, as I had resigned myself to being ineligible for that one. I'm a conscientious voter, and I get some pleasure out of it as well. So, when I saw that a deadline had come for registration in advance for yet another local election (of which there are so many here; I've voted more in the last three years than the seven previous in which I was eligible), I naturally sought to check whether my registration had updated once again.

It had not. Thus begun a frantic whirlwind of websites and phone calls to figure out how I might get it done at this late date. A well-meaning blog cited some city clerk who stated that registration could be taken care of through the mail or in person at the Recorder's office, which stands alone among county main offices in locating itself out on the far fringes instead of the metro area's center. I guess they like their privacy. Truly they are the Greta Garbo of local government.

I took a chance on one of the Recorder's satellite offices, believing that if they also handle voter registration, then they must be able to do what the far flung one can. It was a classic government office, which is to say that it was as old and cramped as it was bare and aesthetically unpleasant. I filled out an application and indulged my love for people-watching as I waited. It was amusing. At one point a man behind me was advised that the particular window I had gone to was closed off, with only those there already permitted to transact their business.

He was a shrewd man. His first question: "Are you kidding me?" Now, low level government employees have never in any recorded instance been known to kid, but it costed nothing to make sure that he wasn't witness to a groundbreaking precedent. He continued on, attempting to gain entrance to the office, but the proud and stalwart defenders of the gate to services held fast, and he was denied. I was somewhat luckier. I don't walk into any place like that hoping that anyone is going to do more than they have to in order to observe the letter of the law and keep their job. The aforementioned gentleman's case is a good example of that.

So it was that I was pleasantly surprised to encounter an abnormally helpful employee, who advised me on being asked that I could hand off my registration to her rather than waiting in line to deliver it to the person at the window. She furthermore flew around the office and made phone calls in order to find out whether my new registration would take hold in time for me to vote in the next piddling election. It was like being lifted away from some circle of hell by an angel who had no business being there. It was a rare experience.