Changing Gears - My Obama Obicycle

Well, today was the deadline in Georgia to register to vote for the November election, so, according to plan, I lifted my cloak of (ostensible) bipartisan invisibility and switched my bike trailer from its alter-ego guise as an unassuming, mild-mannered "register-to-vote-here" mobile voter registration station to its bold, battle-ready incarnation as a partisan Democrat campaign vehicle - one that I am calling the "Obama Obicycle".

A five-minute test drive around my neighborhood was greeted mostly with honking horns and howls of approval. How sweet it is!

Nevertheless, a car-full of young men, from the suburbs I imagine, one flaunting a McCain-Palin t-shirt, apparently on their way to Little Five Points to sample the pleasures of the degenerate, left-leaning popular culture of which their candidates most certainly disapprove, called out, accusing me of consorting with terrorists, encouraged by the latest Sarah Palin initiated "gutter politics" attack.

What to say? "You guys could have been friendly (I had waved to them), or you could have been assholes. You decided to be assholes, just like your know-nothing attack-dog vice-presidential candidate. Do you have any idea what part of town you are in? Welcome to Atlanta and good luck!"

I'll Have What She's Having - Dispatches from the Voter Registration Front

After being inspired several weeks ago by my friend Joy Rousso to put our after-work bicycle rides to good purpose by using them as an opportunity to register voters, I decided to add a bold "Register to Vote Here" sign to my B.O.B. Yak trailer (above). Within a few days I resolved to keep the trailer attached to my bike all the time, not just when I was running errands that required it. Like a workplace photo ID dangling from a lanyard or a t-shirt proclaiming support for some political cause or other, it's easy to forget that such things that one "wears" habitually can attract the attention of people passing by.

I happened to be having lunch on the patio of my favorite local coffee shop (and wine bar) Java Vino the other day where I had left my bike-trailer combo sitting in the parking lot, a few feet away from the sidewalk that borders N. Highland Avenue. While I was preoccupied on my laptop, responding to a backlog of email, an older woman walked up to the patio, approached a young woman sitting near me - whom I took to be a new or infrequent customer, since I didn't know her - and struck up a brief conversation, one that I did not overhear. She then took a seat at a table near the door, without ever entering the shop. I assumed that she was waiting for a friend to arrive and join her for coffee or a bite to eat.

Java Vino has a menu of sandwiches, salads and pastries, but, like most coffee shops, doesn't offer table service. The wait-staff does occasionally make the rounds, busing tables and bringing out orders placed at the counter that take time to prepare. About 10-minutes after the older woman arrived, Dianna, a long-time Java Vino barista, was clearing dishes left on out on the patio, and, having noticed that the woman had been sitting for a while but had not yet ordered, asked her, "Is there something I can get for you? Coffee? Something to eat?"

"No thank you," the older woman responded, "I'm just waiting to register to vote."

Without missing a beat, Dianna began to send her my way, while I, having picked up on what was being discussed, was already dashing to my trailer to retrieve a clipboard, a pen and a blank registration form.

It seems that the older woman - who had just moved to Atlanta from Dallas - had noticed the sign on my trailer as she was walking down the street and had approached the young woman, the one whom I didn't recognize, to ask how she could go about registering to vote. Not knowing me or of my voter registration efforts, they conferred and came to the conclusion that voter registration must be a service offered by the coffee shop to its customers.

I, of course, had forgotten how an unattended bike and trailer with a "Register to Vote Here" sign on it, could be confusing people passing by a retail establishment.

Fortunately for me the older woman was a patient person, one committed to become a registered voter in her new hometown.

Turning the Page - Dispatches from the Voter Registration Front

A middle-aged woman approached me yesterday around a quarter 'til six while I was standing out in front of the Kroger at Edgewood Commons with my bicycle-powered voter registration station and said, "I'm a convicted felon. Can I vote?" I told her, as I had been instructed, that if she had finished serving her sentence, including any time on parole, that the new Georgia law said that she certainly could. "I have done that," she responded, "a long, long time ago."

I could tell by the way she spoke those words that her conviction and her prison sentence were, for her, features of a former life, one that she had left behind entirely, except for a reminder every two years at election time that she was still required to continue to pay a price for mistakes made by her younger self.

"What do I have to do to register," she asked.

"Just fill out one of these forms."

"Do I take it with me?"

"You can take it with you or fill it out here, if you like."

"I want to fill it out right now."

With that she took my clipboard and pen and began to complete the registration form.

Typically I try not to look at people while they do this. The information they supply is personal and I imagine the registration process, like voting itself, to be a private activity. This time I could not help but glance at the woman's face and found myself struck by her expression of quiet determination as she moved the pen carefully across the paper, unlike most registrants at the supermarket who are in a rush to get on with their after-work grocery shopping and to get on home. This time it was different. This time there was an important task to be done and it had to be done properly.

Her words on the voter registration form were the closing words of a story that began "a long, long time ago," one that had finally - and rightfully - come to an end.