Column: What will Election Day hold as Trump and Clinton face off?

I feel a bit strange writing this column, which will be published on Election Day. It seems, from my perspective, looking ahead, that it’s going to be a momentous day, no matter what the results are.

I can’t think beyond Election Day, and I’ve never felt this way about an election before. What is going to become of us? That is the question of the day.

This election has been different in several ways. At the outset of the campaigning, Donald Trump was seen as a joke. Most of us thought he didn’t have a chance. Now there he is on the ballot--or possibly, if you are reading this later in the week, basking in a post-election glow.

While the Trumpians are enthusiastic, the Clintonians are sullen. Hillary does not inspire us. Bernie Sanders did, but somehow the Democratic establishment prevailed, while the Republican center folded.

I wish it could have been the other way around. We’ve ended up with two candidates whom many Americans don’t want to vote for. Since I supported Sen. Sanders in the caucus, I initially thought there was no way I could vote for Secretary Clinton. But that was before Trump secured the nomination.

My first vote in presidential elections went to Jimmy Carter. Having lived through the Watergate scandal, there was no way I was going to support Republican Gerald Ford, even though he seemed like a nice guy. Ronald Reagan, who challenged Carter in 1980, frightened me, although not as much as Trump does. Reagan seemed clueless. And, of course, he was a Republican.

Carter’s vice president, Walter Mondale, didn’t stand a chance against Reagan in 1984. But he was the Democrat, I didn’t like Reagan one bit, and Mondale had been the commencement speaker at my college graduation. Of course he got my vote.

I was excited to support Michael Dukakis, the governor of my home state of Massachusetts, in 1988. He had been a popular governor, a down-to-earth man who rode the MBTA--the subway--to Beacon HIll each day. Surely he stood a strong chance against George H. W. Bush, Reagan’s vice president, who didn’t know the price of groceries because he never had to shop for himself.

But the Dukakis campaign suffered a series of gaffes, the most memorable being footage of the candidate in an M1 Abrams tank. He appeared so ridiculous that the Bush campaign used it in their ads.

By the time 1992 rolled around, I was so tired of Republican rule I was over the moon when Bill Clinton defeated Bush. He was not my first choice, but he would certainly do. Clinton’s reputation would be tarnished later, of course, but I still remember those years as positive ones.

It all seems to have gone downhill from there. Al Gore was someone I could solidly get behind, and the shenanigans that dominated Election Day 2000 infuriated me. Once my anger died down, I was simply heartbroken.

The terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, changed our country forever. I wondered if they would have happened if Gore had taken office. I despaired over the measures taken to limit our liberties in the name of security. I thought George W. Bush was a dolt. He embarrassed me. How in the world did we elect him a second time?

Then, as Election Day neared again, in 2008, I had a candidate I could get enthusiastic about. I even volunteered for the Obama campaign by calling potential voters and urging them to support the senator from Illinois.

President Obama has not fulfilled my expectations. Since the economic crash of 2008, our nation has languished. We needed a candidate this year who could both inspire us and lead us. Instead...we got what we got.

There’s no way I can vote for Trump, and there’s no way I won’t vote. So I’ll have to choose the more rational of the two candidates. But I can’t help but think that by Nov. 9th, some crazy wheels already will be turning.

President Trump says something so stupid and dangerous, the Democrats make plans to impeach him days after the inauguration.

Or President Clinton is satisfied her e-mail scandal finally is behind her, but the Republicans plan a full investigation--days after her inauguration.

The anticipation is almost killing me. But what can I do but wait--and see.