When did we decide that voting just isn’t as cool as it used to be?

As I groaned at the ceiling and nursed my worst hangover of the year by miles, I shuddered in feverish horror at the prospect of dragging myself out of bed to go stand in the blazing sun at my voting station for an hour.

Besides the very real threat to my health, I was also dismayed that it had come to this.

I remember a time when I practically skipped to the polls, proud to further endorse the progress being made by our leaders in the project to build a free, democratic, non-racist and non-sexist society for all South Africans.

As a person of catholic tastes and shifting allegiance, I have found reason, over the decades since the advent of freedom, to vote for most major parties on the ballet.

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The parties I have blessed with my precious vote have been the people in red, blue, yellow, orange, and a few of no fixed colour scheme. All of these votes were cast in the spirit of multi-party democracy and an appreciation for the ability to make a difference, or just to give the little guy a voice in our country’s councils and parliaments.

But slowly, gradually, I became cynical.

Perhaps I came to understand that true power resides within the decision-making bodies of the ANC, and that the NEC, the NWC and the few thousand delegates to national conferences were choosing our leaders and our policies, and that voting was a mere rubber stamp.

Perhaps I saw state capture betray the noble liberation values of the party, and I baulked at being asked to endorse this at the polls.

Perhaps I saw every ANC breakaway party become inept, corrupt, dictatorial microcosms of the mother party, and thought f**k, man.

Maybe I lost faith in democracy when the opposition lost faith in transformation because it might cost them the support of the white right wing, like a magazine recommitting to blonde cover models because black covers offend the racists.

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Perhaps I watched parties, local and national governments become a Venn diagram of criminal networks committed to robbing the homeless of houses, old people of their life savings and the poor of any hope of a better life. Just so they could have bigger houses, more cars and the company of slay queens with more expensive hair at groove.

It might have been that parties themselves became captured by undemocratic interest groups, even while they were ostensibly fighting the capture of the state itself.

Or maybe my respect for voting simply dwindled when I rediscovered the visceral thrill of the protest march as a democratic institution. Marching on the JSE with the EFF, or getting teargassed to hell with Fees Must Fall, or protesting presidential corruption with Cosatu is certainly more fun than queuing for an hour at Sandton fire station on a hangover.

You could also say that more gets accomplished that way.

An organised march of thousands of people is a clear expression of a set of demands. But an election involving millions of voters seems to only generate a swampy stasis and conflicting opinions about what the results even mean.

I’m not sure when, or why I stopped respecting my vote. But it happened.

Ultimately, my propensity to vote was decided by a sweaty struggle of conscience in my hungover bedroom, where my electoral guilt overcame my cynicism. I rose like Lazarus and trudged off to the voting station of doom.

There, I grimly queued through the slanting sun and prayed to the election gods that I would not join the ranks of the fainters, like the one lady who kapped over just before she got to the people with the iPads.

I selected the candidates whom I felt had the least chance of getting into power and doing any damage. I don’t think voting is supposed to work like that, but at least I wasn’t embarrassed with myself. I did wash my hands afterwards, but more due to Covid-correctness than shame.

I tried to honour the process, even in the absence of an offer that appealed to me.

I can confirm that my vote will have no effect on the future governance of this country. I wish it could, though. I wish someone, something, some kind of movement could emerge, or renew itself in a way that captures my imagination and drives me to get passionate, to get involved. Instead of drunk.