(An e-mail originally to friends sent November 6, 2000)

Sorry for the mass mailing, but I just wanted to appeal to all of you to vote.

I know both of the leading candidates are easy to get mixed up in a lot of ways, and I'm not trying to push you to vote for a particular candidate.

But while I strongly support one of them, I support even more strongly the need for people our age to show up at the polls and make it known that we have concerns. We need to make it known that anyone with eyes on elected office had better have an ear bent in our general direction.

We, as a demographic group, don't have much money. We can't buy influence the way CEOs and corporations can. We live in a country that is so big, our one drop in the bucket seems to make less of a splash than ever.

And yet, as a shrinking portion of the country votes, those who do bother to can still hold tremendous sway. It's no surprise that Social Security and Medicare are leading issues, while so many issues that more directly affect us are not only glossed over, they're often not even brought up as serious issues.

Whether you vote Tuesday or not, it's not going to be reported on the evening news that you did something heroic for you country or the state of democracy. But that's not the point.

In Arthur Ashe's very excellent autobiography, Days of Grace, he writes about the decline of society and how it has impacted the African American community.

"I know that the deterioration occurred in my adult lifetime. Thus, I must bear part of the responsibility for the way in which African American culture has declined. Not I myself personally, but my generation collectively; if we wish to take most of the credit for what is creditable, then we must shoulder most of the blame for the amount that is discreditable."

There has probably been no better example in my lifetime of a man who did what he could for the betterment of his fellow man than Ashe.

In his lifetime the barrier-breaking tennis star suffered the indignity of segregation and was arrested numerous times while demonstrating against apartheid when it was far from being the "cool cause of the moment." In his final days, he brought a new perspective to the AIDS debate after contracting the disease following heart surgery. And through it all, he did it with grace and dignity and never lost sight of his goal of making a difference.

Now I ask you, is taking a few minutes out of your day to pull a lever so much to ask?

Chad
sleepdeprived@hotmail.com