It’s a beautiful day in the Age of Global Warming, 60 degrees, sunny.  We are having an informal “eclectic-election” party in the backyard, and I’ve been lolling on an Adirondack chair swigging Diet Coke.   My cousin snuck inside to check her phone, which we forbade her to bring outside.

“It’s too early for the news!”

On the one hand I am confident that Hillary Clinton will be our next president, on the other hand I am  apprehensive about the alternative.   If Hillary wins, this is a historic day for the U.S.   She will be our first woman president, and  can you believe it has taken almost 100 years?  The 19th amendment (women’s suffrage) was ratified in 1920.

If the alternative happens, I will read Sinclair Lewis’s It Can’t Happen Here.

But that won’t happen.

Yet, oddly, it is Obama, not Clinton, who has the power to move me.  I teared up this morning when I read  a New York Times article,  “‘Fired Up’ Obama Makes Final Push for Clinton, and His Legacy,” about Obama’s campaigning for Hillary in Ann Arbor yesterday.  Here’s an excerpt from the article.

“I already voted,” he added. “I voted for Hillary Clinton, because I am absolutely confident that when she is president, this country will be in good hands — and I’m asking you to do the same.”-

“I love you!” supporters kept shouting at the president as he turned serious to lay out the stakes of an extraordinary race.

“I love you back — I do,” Mr. Obama said in Michigan. “But tomorrow, you will choose whether we continue this journey of progress, or whether it all goes out the window.”

Why did I tear up?  It’s a rock concert thing, yelling “I love you!” But I realized that I, too, love Obama, and  it’s not a word I use lightly:  I am beyond enjoying wispy love lyrics of rock songs. I think very little about politics, but out of the corner of my eye and ear I have had faith in his judgment and gravitas.  Who else could have passed the Affordable Care Act?  God knows, others , including Hillary, have tried. He is brilliant and eloquent. He is popular.  He took over the government in the mess after the financial crash of 2008.  He is, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, a great role model.  He reads.  His conversation with Marilynne Robinson was published in The New York Review of Books.  He exercises.

President Barack Obama arrives for a private game of basketball at Fort McNair in Washington.

This morning Obama played basketball with friends at Ft. McNair in Washington:  it is one of his election rites.  He  played basketball on every election day when he ran for president.   And this time he’s playing basketball for Clinton.

My husband thinks it would be a good idea if we all  played basketball today.  I took a walk instead, because I am not good at sports involving throwing round objects.

I’m one of the leftists (left-middleists?  middle-leftists?) who has rallied behind Hillary Clinton, because Bernie Sanders’ campaign was just a beautiful dream, and Clinton will continue the great work of Obama, who has been the best president of my lifetime. I didn’t sign on to be a grown-up, mind you, it just happened. Voting for the better candidate is part of being an adult.   Secretary of State, Senator, First Lady: Clinton has gravitas.

I’m waiting for the results!