Starting Young

Today I manned the voter registration table at a Community Fun Day event in a nearby city. We were in a park in a poor section and the event wasn't attended by as many people as any of us would have liked but it was a success on several levels (registering 11 new voters is something that I am proud of).

The biggest success was, I think, was the interest the kids had in participating. The park is surrounded by low-income housing and quite a few of the local kids came in and out of the park to see what was going on. A group of them stayed at the table I was working and several took it upon themselves, one girl in particular, to take over the raffle sales. They were enthusiastic and stayed for the entire event. Everytime someone bought a ticket they immediately handed me the money and then took it upon themselves to make sure the person filled things out right. They took pleasure in handing out bumper stickers and campaign buttons. I didn't understand what they were saying half the time as they easily switched between English and Spanish. The one thing that did come through clearly was their enthusiam.

One young boy proudly told me he didn't need to register because he had already voted for Obama. I smiled (probably in that irritating as hell way adults can) and said something to the effect of that's great but we don't vote until November and that you need to be a bit older but it's great that you're involved. He shook his head at me and pulled his Obama/Biden button and stretched his shirt out towards me (guessing, perhaps, that I just don't see well) and said, "No, I voted!"

I nodded and agreed with him and was distracted by a couple of adults who came over. The exchange stuck in my head though and in a quiet moment I watched the group of them (fluctuated between eight to fifteen). Every single child was sporting a button. When we found a bag of buttons with images of Senators Obama and Biden on them many of them they wanted to swap the ones they had for the newly discovered ones (of course I let them). Most of the kids also sported the campaign logo on their cheeks courtesy of a face-painting volunteer.

Maybe they decided to hang out with all of us for the snacks and music or perhaps because we were new and different in their park but no one asked them to help man the tables and no one asked them to help clean up afterwards and yet that is what several of them did.

They're too young to vote. They won't even be able to vote in 2012 but I think their participation today made an impression on a handful of them. Some were listening carefully to what I was telling the newly registered voters. They were listening carefully to people when they came up to the table and proudly announced that they'd registered first thing when they turned 18 or that they too have been involved in this campaign. They listened and observed everything.

It is my hope that when they went home tonight they asked their parents if they are registered to vote. It is my hope that they saw a group of strangers working together for a common cause and realized that they were a part of it, a part of something larger than themselves. I hope they carry this experience with them and that it helps them reach out to work with others throughout their lives.