When I trained for the NYC marathon (the first and only marathon I will ever run), I experienced the much talked about “taper” that comes at the end of such long-distance training. Seasoned runners are well aware of the technique: when you cut down on mileage significantly in the days leading up to the race to conserve energy. There’s an anxiety that comes with it, termed, poetically, “taper madness,” when many runners feel on edge due to the decrease in exercise combined with the looming race.

I had taper madness big time before the marathon. I felt jumpy and annoyed. Yesterday, the day before this momentous election, I felt something like that madness again, although not due to a lack of running. It was due, of course, to the almost-here-one-day-more-this-is-it upcoming presidential election, which we’ve all been talking about for, oh, some time now.

I had some short writing assignments to complete that I sabotaged with frantic texting and news scrolling. I finally gave up, ate about 15 Hersheys miniatures left over from Halloween then started cleaning out the refrigerator. Nora smiled at me like I (instead of she) was a child. “What are you doing?” she asked, kindly.

“I feel crazy,” I told her, Krackel wrappers escaping my pockets. “Cleaning stuff out makes me feel better.”

In the evening I made myself some tea that had the word “calming” in big letters on the box and got into bed, where my current book (the soothing “Gilead” by Marilynne Robinson) put me near coma-like sleep within a few paragraphs. I woke up at 5 am, knowing that our alarm - which we never set - was going to go off at 6 so I could get to the polling place near-first-thing. There was no point trying to get back to sleep, although I lay there in the evaporating darkness for the next hour.

Around 6:30 am, armed with my coffee, a magazine, sweater, coat and hat, I walked down to the elementary school where we vote in state elections. I joined the line of people, masked and maintaining distance between each other, that was backed up past the school sign, my heart full.

I love Election Day. The feeling of purpose and duty. The sense that we are all in it together, even when we don’t agree on the outcome. I know the stakes are too high this year for any real sense of “togetherness,” but I felt it this morning. On my walk by the pond with the ducks. Past the houses full of families just getting up. In line with my fellow neighbors, voters, Americans.

Inside the school - which is, by the way, my kids’ school - when the helpful volunteers asked: do you have any questions? And: does your street name start with a letter between A and L? Younger poll workers this year because, I suppose, young people heeded the call to help out when needed during this endless pandemic. Heart even fuller.

And then, rounding the corner and into the gym, the feeling got strong enough that I had to take a few deep breaths and stifle some tears (get it together, it’s time to vote! I told myself) because there on the walls were messages of positivity (“It’s ok to make mistakes!) and children’s drawings decrying bullying and championing the power of optimism.

Inside the gym, by the wide entrance doors, were colorful name tags. The students and teachers must have left them there one day, and now they’d become cheerful decor. I looked - as I made my way towards the check-in table and voting booths, small chairs indicating the six-feet marks - and saw they were names I recognized: my first grader’s classmates and teacher. And there, sure enough, was hers: “Aidy,” it said, black marker on a polkadot sticker.

Aidy, my most emotional and ebullient child, who has been concerned about my level of concern regarding this election. She sensed the urgency. She asked me about it often.

So, yesterday, I said to her: “Guess what tomorrow is? Finally?”

Blue eyes wide, then wider. “Is it the vote?!” she asked.

I replied, “Yes!”