Texas voting

I realize that the election has been past for over nearly nine months already. There are no longer any votes to be tallied, no more Presidential candidates TV commercials to be aired, nor any more conventions and rallies to attend. Even though the season is over, politics are still firmly engrained into the Americain mind.

I was touring the Stockyards of Fort Worth, Texas this afternoon, enjoying the sights of an area formally devoted to the exchange and sale of hundreds of thousands of heads of livestock a year. Now, in this era of auctions and computers, the Stockards have been rendered obsolete. Insead of cattle, they now welcome tourists year round who wish to experience some of Texas’ agricultural history. Pens that used to hold sheep and swine have been converted into shopping areas and eateries.

In the corner of one of these areas was a little bookstore, specializing in used volumes of Texan lore. Books about cowboys, Jesse James, and combine harvesters lined old dusty shelves. An elder gentleman sat behind a glass counter, shooting the wind with another senior citizen outfitted in the garb of a true native Texan. Honestly, the books were of little interest to me. As most students will understand, there is little time for recreational reading during the school year anyway. What laid under the glass counter that he man was leaning on caught me eye, though.

Political buttons of many generations of American history laid there in protective cases. Experiencing the last election as a student on a large college campus was very exciting. It was easy to get caught in the wave of rallies, parties, and campaigning that was at the University of Washington. Somewhere in a drawer in my room, I still have a collection of stickers, buttons, and posters. And here was a collection that spanned not only the last election, but all the way back to Kennedy.

I couldn’t help myself. I bought a “George Bush for President ’88” button. It will join the ranks of many other buttons on the strap of my book bag. I feel like I am safer from the wrath of people who did not support Bush senior, being that most of he political activist on camps were just born during that area. As I placed he button on my bag, the two older gentleman engaged me in an excited discussion of past Presidential candidates. As I had chosen a button from an extensive collection, it would make sense that I would be familiar with all of he candidates in the glass case, wouldn’t it? I believe that both gentleman forgot they were speaking to a man of much fewer years than they, as they debated with me the effectiveness of Spiro Agnew as a vice President, and whether or not Ross Perot’s stand on healthcare was still applicable now. I smiled, nodded, and tried to paricipate in the conversation that began to drift to simply between he both of them.

Both men were obviously politically active in this past era. And in ’88, both men voted for Bush.