When I lost my electoral virginity

By the time I was 18, I was gagging to do the deed.

There was no peer pressure – although my friends and I did discuss who we were going with – it was more because I felt like a fully-formed adult and this was the rite of passage to mark it, one that I'd heard brought an overwhelming sense of satisfaction.
Then I did it. I got to vote.
My first time happened at the general election of 1997, otherwise known as the one where 18 years of Conservative Party domination came to an end and Tony Blair began his.
Discovering that my parents had never voted either (coming from the ‘we’re Indian, we don’t count in English politics’ mindset) I tried to coax them to come along too. The hour-long speech I’d prepared must have ben good because two minutes in, my mum ran out the house raring to go and tearing her hair out, presumably in anticipation.
After she calmed down, her only major worry was that she had no idea about the system or who to vote for. An obstacle, I admit. Now, I know you shouldn’t influence anyone’s vote, but I saw this as special circumstance, in that I just told her which party to vote for. My opinion was the right one. She didn’t really have one. It just made life easier.
The polling station was my childhood school, so when we made our way there it only conjured up memories of the days we used to have off when there was an election. I always wondered what the hell went on while I was at home watching Simon And The Witch, but it was only on 1 May 1997 that I found out.
Walking in, I half-forgot about the matter at hand, as I looked at the walls lined with potato prints of butterflies, and a long caterpillar with dozens of differently-drawn legs on them. Is there a grown-up job which involves painting and doing papier mache and writing ‘A’ very clearly on an A4 piece of paper? If so, I want it.
So we got to the scary hall. There were a few people milling about – it was busier than I expected, I remember – but at the front was a scary desk, lined with old battleaxes like it was an interview panel for a long-suffering granddaughter. Two had blue hair, three had purple and one had barely any.
“Do you have your polling card?” they asked me sweetly, clearly containing their venom-dribble until we were on our way out.
Ha ha. Yes we did – suck on that, grannies.
Clearly perturbed at not being able to open the trapdoor in which they store their victims, they went about their business. Now, here’s a conspiracy theory to throw into the works: their work seemed to involve writing my polling card number onto the form itself, making it clear who I voted for. A secret ballot? Hmm…
The time came to go into the booth. It was the part I was dreading most, for no reason other than I hadn’t done it before and I was completely on my own, but once there, chewed-up pencil-on-a-string in hand and a form which required a big ‘X’, I’d forgotten my previous concern. Instead, I was studying the list of names in front of me, having not quite realised how many independents were standing. It was then that I heard a voice behind me.
“Who did you say I should vote for again, dear?” my mum asked, her head protruding from the side of the screen.
The milling-about people swung their heads around, shocked and appalled at how I’d brainwashed my very own mother. My face went red. The room went silent. If ever I needed the battleaxes’ trapdoor to work, it would have been then.
But we survived. And I got to vote.