This is what being American feels like. Today. Seeing so many voters taking part. It’s insane. It’s beautiful. It’s history. Some day my kids will ask me where I was. I should be at Grant Park, but I hate crowds. And public transit. And massive amounts of people. Plus I didn’t have the golden ticket. So whatever.

I’m here, texting my sister who’s in a bar in DeLand (NoManLand) Florida, waiting for the Florida projection…talking online to a couple friends via Facebook, and staring at the TV screen where ABC is doing a great job of coverage. They have this crazy touchscreen board where Charlie Gibson touches a state, and it zooms into counties, and then he touches it again, and it gets all the stats of the state, down to black versus latinos, versus first time voters versus people making over $200,000. I love technology. It’s insane.

And I’m in awe. Even sitting watching election coverage, walking the dog for the nighttime walk, the air is filled with excitement, filled with this energy of extreme hope of a new tomorrow. Whatever the outcome, at least, for right now, for this night only, people care about this election, which means they care about democracy, which means they care about America. And that is a powerful thing.

It doesn’t matter who you voted for, who you’re rooting for, and who you hope to win. It’s the fact that you voted. You participated. You showed up and took matters into your own hands. And that deserves more than a free tall burnt cup of coffee from Starbucks. That deserves admiration. That deserves a pat on the back (even if its just you patting yourself on the back). That deserves a deep breath and a swell of American pride. Tonight, Americans finally showed up…and I can’t help but feel optimistic.

Here’s to optimisim. Here’s to a new tomorrow. Here’s to America.

1) Cheering for the football team that doesn’t just kick around a ball.
2) Singing the Star Spangled Banner…no matter where you are.
3) Sitting at Jury Duty wondering why you took a mediocre book to an 8-hour solitary confinement.

Ah, yes, Jury Duty. Completely all American, completely what they say it is…if you aren’t chosen, it is the LONGEST day of your life…next to getting asked out by your crush. It was my first time as a juror, and boy, was I nervous. Everytime that bat phone rang, it echoed through my ears into my thumping heart…would I be chosen to decide the fate of my fellow citizen? 

Alas, I wasn’t chosen…almost, for a trial I had read about that morning, but I didn’t get to spread my opinion into the Americana universe. No, I just spent the entire day playing solitaire on my Palm (I won twelve…count them…twelve times!) and was trying to get through a rather difficult, well-known book that was highly praised (The Time Travelers Wife, for all you who have read it…I am so confused). I had read InStyle and found out how correctly to identify my skin type, as well as cruised through a provided Rachel Ray (I will never cook like her), and learned how to make my house more “Nantucket” in Metropolitan Home, but I still wasn’t picked for a trial. I was all nervous about being on a trial, until we were introduced to a video telling us of our “civic” duty, narrated by none other than Lester Holt. Somehow, the process seemed less arboures with him at the helm.

But I did learn something that I never knew…America is the only country in the world who has a jury system. The only country where an accused fate sits in the hands of his fellow man. That made me kinda proud in a very patriotic, salute the flag kind of way. I was also witness to the fact that the world does not revolve around me…you read that right…the fact that, for one day, all these people come together to serve a law that was written so long ago, that all these people come from all walks of life, all in different parts in their life, some good, some bad, but all different and unique in their own way. All these people have jobs and families and drama and life…it just amazes me that when I think my job is tiring, or I think I am the only one going through a life crisis, to come to something as simple as the Jury Room and find out that I am not alone in this world, and vice-versa, the world, as we know it, does not revolve around me…surprising, I know, but true! It’s like when you are at the airport, people-watching, all these people are going somewhere, going to or coming back from, and there is so much emotion in such a little space that you just realize that you are one in a million person breathing today…living today…and it makes me just feel all warm and fuzzy inside…for as the saying goes, there is always someone with bigger problems than you, and somehow, knowing that, knowing that whatever life problems that seem so big at the time, the minute I was congregated with all these walks of life into one simple room, my problems didn’t seem so severe, and I couldn’t help but smile.

Until I realized I brought a bad book and still have 6 hours to go…