Election Day/Night 2008

Heath and I woke up Tuesday morning and headed to our polling place at Chase Park first thing. The lines weren't too bad—we waited for about an hour—but there was definitely a lot of energy and excitement. According to the woman working our location, more than 20% of our precinct voted before 9am.





After a distracted day at work (and the Grind), we picked up some Chinese food and headed to Aaron and Lenore's place...a.k.a. Election Central. We had MSNBC and multiple blogs/websites going to keep us well-informed. Lisa joined us there to watch the early returns come in. Once Ohio and New Mexico came in for Obama, we knew it was time to head downtown.



More than 250,000 people converged on Grant Park—it was amazing! And although we weren't in the ticketed part of the park, we joined thousands of others watching jumbo-tron screens throughout the area. Micah and Keith met up with us and we all stood together to watch Barack's speech. There was laughing, crying, dancing, and many chanting, "Yes, we can," and later in the evening, "Yes, we did."











Our beautiful city came out in full force. From Oprah to frat boys from Lincoln Park, mothers from Englewood, Hindu fathers from Devon Street, young, old, rich, poor...everyone was there. Michigan Avenue (the Magnificent Mile) was shut down with people walking and cheering in the streets. It was very special to be downtown and watch history being made.