Change is good

As you know, I take voting VERY seriously. We had a mayoral election here in Chicago today, and, of course I voted! Mr. Rahm Emanuel is our new mayor, which is interesting because Mayor Richard Daley has been mayor since I was maybe 7 or 8 or something like that. He's the only mayor I really know and I'm almost 32 years old! The only other mayor I remember is Mayor Harold Washington, the first and only black mayor. I remember going to a restaurant as a kid and my dad being so excited to meet him. Mayor Washington was so gracious, I remember him picking me up...I think there's a picture of that somewhere around here.

Well, anyway, what struck me about this mayoral race is that all the candidates were minority or 'other.' At least 3 candidates were African-American, 2 were Latino/Mexican and one was Jewish. It was very culturally diverse. For Chicago, this is significant because Chicago is well-known for being a major city that is very racially segregated.

And this is quite true.

To this day there are some neighborhoods that make me nervous after a certain hour because of previous unpleasant racial experiences. Chicago is also a city with a very large black population that has historically voted for black candidates. This is mostly due to the fact that until recently the only option was white candidates and we were excited to have other options, but that's a topic for another day. This is interesting to note because Mr. Emanuel won a HUGE percentage of the black vote, he won the majority of the black vote in every ward in Chicago.

I won't tell you who I voted for in this election because I don't want my beliefs plastered all over the Internet. haha. But I will tell you that I don't vote along racial or party lines. I vote for whom I believe will best serve my interests. I did not vote 'black' in this election. I know this has nothing to do with occupational therapy but this is very important to me. I believe very strongly in voting. I hope these rants encourage people to make more of an effort to vote in future elections. I'm always very disappointed and agitated with people who give crappy reasons for not going to the polls. Anyway...

I am very happy to have a new mayor.

Change is good.