Election Day morning television polls were predicting an Obama victory, but I sipped my coffee nervously. I’ve never cared much about politics – Watergate, Iran Contra, Bill Clinton and a string of election fiascos had pretty much killed any faith I had in transformative governance, but seven years of the Bush administration’s half-truths, and 4,000 dead American soldiers in the Iraq War, had gotten my attention.

I wanted Obama to win.

He seemed different – smart, articulate and savvy, and at the very least, honorable. But I was cautious as a kicked dog. “Obama is black,” I thought, as I snapped off the set in my very white, very comfortable American suburb, “that’s reason enough for him not to win.”

A few hours later, a neighbor called with an invitation to a last-minute return watching party. “I just voted,” she said, “and I’m so excited. We’ll be celebrating!” Don’t say it, I wanted to tell her. Anything can happen.

Around lunchtime, I voted. No lines, no complications, just an emphatic pull of the lever, and my part in two years of political machinations was done. A local reporter asked how it had felt. “Exhilarating,” I answered, realizing it was true.

I resisted the urge to check the news in the afternoon. “It’ll just be yakking pundits,” I thought, and met a friend for a walk instead. The weather was weirdly warm in an apocalyptic kind of way, and she confessed her belief that voting machines were rigged.

In the evening, I had an event at my daughter’s school. On the drive home we turned on the radio with unexpected news from a key swing state. “Pennsylvania has gone to Obama,” said the announcer, and I smiled. “Maybe, yes?” I dared, absorbing for the first time how devastated I would be if Obama didn’t win.

Then it was off to the neighbor’s party. CNN blasted from the television sitting front and center. Wine loosened everyone up to moderate optimism. “Obama has 207 electoral votes, but polls in California close in about fifteen minutes, and that should put him over the top,” someone shouted.

I wasn’t convinced. Any moment now there’d be a rush of overlooked votes – a last minute acknowledgement of some moldering law. “The numbers will have to be reexamined,” solemn faced newscasters would explain while shuffling their papers.

But wait a minute! The screen was blinking a countdown. In big blue graphics, 11:00 p.m. clicked into place, and like a sportscaster calling a horse race, Wolf Blitzer croaked out the winner’s name, “Barack Obama is America’s president-elect!”

Incredible.

Foreign emotion tugged at my gut. Pride? Hope, perhaps. A tangle of disbelief loosened into effervescence, and I felt something I’d never before equated with politics – simple and complete joy. For many of us, it was a good day in a very big backyard.