He Won by a LANDSLIDE!!!

After voting yesterday, Cappy set about working hard all day, trying to whip our yard back in shape, with me dragging behind, totin' and fetchin', draggin' and haulin'. The whole time we kept one eye on Jude and Sonia's house, just because. The way things are today, you just never know. (Everybody in three counties...parishes knew they wouldn't be home on election day.) And all day, between quick breaks, we'd ask, "I wonder how the voting is going...I wonder who's ahead right now". Finally after a longggg day of hot sweaty, pollen-laden work, we headed in, got showered and right into pj's, preparing to tumble, exhausted, into bed, when I noticed cars lining the street. "Oh!!!" I told Cappy, we should get dressed and go on over to see how things are going and to await the results with them". By then, Cappy was already in bed and halfway asleep, and his thought was that, even if we did get dressed and go on over, that with so many people we'd either get lost in the shuffle or get in the way, and it's Cappy's way to do things more on a personal one-to-one level, so he said, "No, we aint goin' nowhere tonight; we'll find out in the mornin'". "It is ok if I turn on the tv in here then?" "No." Oh alright, because I was truly spent anyhow, I fell into bed, too. We were sound asleep when sometime later the phone rang. I don't remember even hearing it, or the answering machine picking it up, but it was Sonia's sister, also our neighbor saying that she just wanted us to know that "Jude won!" At that we sat bolt upright and "Wha-hoo'd"; finally somebody honest had won using a clean political campaign in South Louisiana! We are soooooo very proud of them...Jude and Sonia. He's a good man, and she's the good woman behind him. In the words of Jimmy Buffett, she's "the woman to blame". We love them both dearly and are so excited for them.
This morning Cappy got up very early, went outside to begin sawing up some of the wood we had pruned from the trees, when he spotted Jude, still in his pj's, across the street talking on a cell phone, while letting their dog 'stretch his legs'. Seeing Jude in his red plaid bathrobe, Cappy couldn't resist: "Ohhh, I was wondering what robe the judges were wearing this season". Jude hollard back, "It's the only robe I've got!" So Cappy said, "Well, whatcha wearin' it outside for...practicin'?" Then they met in the middle of the street and Jude came in for a handshake, but big ol' softy teddybear Cappy thinkin' "Heck, that aint enough", went in and gave him a great big hug. It brings tears to Cappy's eyes and a lump in his throat; "Been knowin' the man for a long time, and he's more than a good man and a good a good friend and neighbor, and now EVAH-body knows it, too!"
I guess they do...Jude won by a landslide.
What spoke to my heart was, the other day when we were on our way back from our friends Sam and Louise's house, we got behind an old truck loaded with political signs and a speaker calling for people to get out and vote for Jude. Now Jude, if you recall from past postings, has received some pretty 'high-falootin' awards. He can run with the 'big dawgs'. He rubs shoulders with some pretty influential people. But this particular truck in question was so old and rickety, and when I say it was rust colored, I mean it was so completely rusted, that rust was it's color. It's driver was a scrawny wrinkled old black gentleman. A perfect compliment; truck and driver. The man's demeanor, as he drove his truck around, was one of pride. To me, it spoke of something akin to love, that campaigning for Jude had awakened in both the gentleman and his truck. Jude has helped so many people in his career as a lawyer, even those who couldn't afford to pay. Judge Jude Gravois speaks for everybody.
(And to our silly Yankee grandkids, who saw the political sign in the yard, and I didn't get a chance to respond to you, "Yes, he will be Judge JUDE, and the 'e' on Jude IS silent, ya big dummies!")