philadelphia <u+2014> when hillary clinton conceded defeat to barack obama in the democratic primary campaign in 2008, she said that <u+201c>although we weren<u+2019>t able to shatter that highest, hardest glass ceiling this time, thanks to you, it<u+2019>s got about 18 million cracks in it, and the light is shining through like never before.<u+201d> i brought my daughters with me to vote on tuesday afternoon, to watch me cast a ballot that i hoped would help break the ceiling forever, and i thought of my nanna, who will be 101 next week, who lived long enough to vote for a woman for president. my 13-year-old was complaining (<u+201c>i have homework!<u+201d>). my 8-year-old was thrilled, until she found out that, as voter number 705 in our precinct, we were too late for <u+201c>i voted<u+201d> stickers. <u+201c>normally, we get maybe 200,<u+201d> the poll worker said. in the voting booth, i got predictably confused by the ballot initiatives, and predictably teary when we pressed the green button marked <u+201c>vote.<u+201d> it was good to finally feel something other than the fear, disappointment and cynicism that have characterized how my family has experienced campaign 2016. <u+201c>i<u+2019>m sick about it,<u+201d> my nanna declared, on tuesday afternoon, with cnn blaring in the background. she was 5 years old when women got the right to vote, but sounded as if any excitement about voting for a woman was outweighed by her disgust for donald j. trump, whom she called <u+201c>reprehensible.<u+201d> she recalled humayan khan, killed while serving in iraq, and how his f ather told his son<u+2019>s story at the democratic national convention with his wife at his side. <u+201c>that broke my heart to listen to that father talk, and because the mother didn<u+2019>t say anything, trump had to make a miserable comment,<u+201d> nanna said. <u+201c>and it was horrible. horrible. the way he talks about women <u+2014> i<u+2019>ve never heard such mean things. and the way hillary just took it, and kept her chin up in the air.<u+201d> on our way home, with the teenager racewalking back to the <u+201c>odyssey<u+201d> and the 8-year-old making pointed inquiries about when she might expect dinner, i thought about what this election showed my daughters, what it showed all of us, about the place of women in america. i thought, of course, about mr. trump<u+2019>s infamous caught-on-tape recounting of sexual assault, about how he<u+2019>d just <u+201c>start kissing<u+201d> beautiful women, and where he<u+2019>d grab them, about how, when you<u+2019>re a star, <u+201c>they let you do it.<u+201d> and i thought about the other people on the bus, cameramen, a production assistant, their faces blank, as if they hadn<u+2019>t heard anything unusual, as if this was just another day at work. <u+201c>locker room talk,<u+201d> mr. trump called it. i thought about brock turner at stanford , the star swimmer who assaulted a woman he met at a party; then cast himself as the real victim whose athletic career was ruined over <u+201c>20 minutes of action,<u+201d> as his father put it. i thought about male soccer players at harvard , crudely ranking the looks of their female counterparts. i thought, truly, the world is a locker room, and women are its participation trophies, arranged by size and by attractiveness, handed out to the stars, or even to the guys who just show up. i thought of the women who made excuses for mr. trump <u+2014> the ones who said that this is how men are, or this is how the world is, the ones who had shrugged off their own experiences with a groping boss or a leering colleague as the price of doing business, the cost of existing while female. i thought about the women who came forward to say that mr. trump had done exactly what he<u+2019>d boasted about doing, and how he sneered that they weren<u+2019>t attractive enough to be bothered with. and i thought, as i voted, about mrs. clinton. about the ways in which she was not just criticized but demonized, about the way her opponents cast her as a power-mad lady macbeth, an unfaithful, murderous jezebel who was also somehow frigid, and by the way, also gay. i thought about how female ambition is still seen as some kind of unsightly character flaw, a blemish to be covered up and played down. i considered the way a woman can prepare her whole life for a job, can work and study and push through pneumonia and still be dismissed as a boring wonk with an annoying voice. on tuesday, i watched, amazed, as mrs. clinton kept pushing, kept trying to smile through what had long since become a joyless, demeaning slog, and still found a moment, on the last day of her campaign, to facetime with her granddaughter . <u+201c>i was sick about this. for the whole election,<u+201d> nanna said. watching the results unfold, i was sick, too. what did my daughters see at what was supposed to be the revolution? they learned that, while we tell our daughters <u+201c>you can do anything,<u+201d> the presidency still might stay a theoretical. they learned that, as we inch toward equality, there is still work to be done. they learned that <u+201c>boys will be boys<u+201d> is still a valid argument, even when the boy in question was 59 at the time. they learned that men get excused for their misdeeds, while women are blamed for their mistakes <u+2014> and those of their spouses. they learned that, if you try to break a glass ceiling, you<u+2019>d better be prepared to get cut. jennifer weiner is the author, most recently, of the memoir <u+201c>hungry heart,<u+201d> and a contributing opinion writer. follow the new york times opinion section on facebook and twitter (@nytopinion), and sign up for the opinion today newsletter . a version of this op-ed appears in print on november 9, 2016, on page a27 of the new york edition with the headline: taking my daughters to vote. today's paper | subscribe
taking my daughters to vote
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