For the first time since I turned 18, today I was relatively close to Massachusetts, where I am registered to vote, on voting day. I never got my act together to request that an absentee ballot be sent to New York, but I decided that voting was important enough to me that it was worth going home for. Massachusetts goes Democrat during the general elections, but for the primaries I have some power.

I woke up this morning and made coffee in my Brooklyn apartment. I was too lazy to walk downstairs and pick up the New York Times, so I read an article from Sunday’s paper. I may be too lazy to walk down a flight of stairs, I told myself, but I’m not too lazy to vote.

At 8:00 AM I was boarding the Chinatown bus to Boston. There were two other passengers on the bus. They’re probably going home to vote, too, I thought to myself.

By 1:15 PM I had blackened in the one oval that mattered to me. It was a pleasant, efficient and empowering experience.

Up until the moment I looked at the ballot paper, I had been debating who to vote for. I have never been this undecided before. My favorite newspaper’s editorial board endorsed one candidate, and my favorite newspaper op-ed columnist endorsed a different one. What to make of that? In the end I voted for the candidate who I think is most knowledgeable on foreign policy issues and who will best fight for the rights of marginalized people in the US and abroad.

Tomorrow I will get up Super Early to board a bus back to New York, where I will confront Super Wednesday. Super Wednesday will offer less opportunity to formally exercise my civic duty, but it will probably involve a nice long work out and a Law and Order episode. Slightly more self-serving activities, perhaps, but sometimes I feel like I’m helping fight crime just by providing a running commentary (i.e. “No! It can’t be him, it’s only 25 minutes into the show.” Or “Keep your cool, Stabler, no one wins if you pound his head into that window.”) while watching Vincent D’Onofrio and Jack McCoy do their work.