I have an appointment at the car dealership today. They called me a couple weeks ago and asked if I’d consider turning in my CC before the lease was up, and if I did they’d give me the exact same deal on a 2013 model. I made the appointment for today, not realizing at the time it was election day. 

The back seat of my car is dominated by a doggie hammock, which hangs on both front headrests and both the rear ones, making the floor beneath the front seats a kind of forgotten land, where just a bunch of stuff has collected over the years. I may have to turn in the car in a few hours so I cleaned all that stuff out. Most of it was garbage. Literally, in some cases. A Starbucks cup, junk mail, a box of Legos (?), a handout from a Kehinde Wiley exhibit, receipts. And then there was this. My “I Voted” sticker from 2008, preserved on the cover of a Moleskine, along with some other sticky artifacts. I found that this very morning under the front seat of my car.

That sticker predates everything. It predates my ex-girlfriend, it predates Old Jews Telling Jokes, it predates Rufus dying. It predates my sister’s wedding and my grandfather’s funeral. It predates moving to Silver Lake. It predates anything I ever submit to The Awl. It predates even meeting a whole swath of people who have become best friends.

There are few things that get us to think in terms of multiple-year chunks of time. The Olympics are one, elections are another. I had a four-year lease on that CC. I might get a new one today.