w00t.

Mailed my absentee ballot on my way in to work this morning.

Can't very well hold my breath for a whole week, but that's what it'll feel like, I'm sure.

stop the clock

538.com made me cry.

Back at the rally, after the march had left MLK Gardens, I'd gone back for the car while Brett took photos, and I spotted a very old black man in a sharp Sunday suit walking slowly at the very back of the huge march. He hadn't yet arrived at the voting center, and I decided to find him when I got back.

I wanted to go talk to him, to ask him what this moment meant to him. He was a guy who you take one glance at, and know, that guy's seen it all. I wanted a quote. I had my journalist hat on. I thought, this will be great.

So when I got back to the voting location with the car, I went to find him in the line. Eventually I spotted him, and was ready to walk up the few feet between us and introduce myself when I stopped in my tracks.

A young black boy, no more than eight years old, walked up to this man, who was at least eighty. The boy offered the man a sticker, probably an "I Voted" sticker, but I couldn't see. The man took the sticker and paused. Silently, he looked down at the boy, who was looking back up at the man. The man put his hand gently on the boy's head, and I saw his eyes glisten.

I didn't ask the man for a quote. I didn't need to. I walked over by myself, behind the community center, and I sat down on a bench next to the track, and wept.

To trivialize just for a second: you know how I loved The West Wing, right. And you remember the episode where Charlie gets a letter to the president from a little kid that turns out to have been sent to FDR in the 30's? And the little kid is now an old man, and his son brings him to the White House, and after he gets his picture taken with the president, he says "I'd like my picture taken with that young man, if you don't mind", and the old man is just bursting with pride for Charlie, because look how much the world has changed since he was a boy. That moment always had me misting up a little bit.

Y'all, that was nothing.