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Pat McCrory fills out the voter slip – address, name, signature. He holds it out to the poll worker: “Do I take this with me?”
“Hand it to the ladies back there,” says the poll worker, Lynn Rogers, who has known McCrory for years. She sighs. “He never has learned how to do this.”
Forgive the mayor a brain cramp on this Election Day. First of all, he just got off a plane – he was down in Tampa, talking up mass transit.
It's also the first time in 20 years Pat McCrory has stared at a ballot in a city election and not seen his own name.
Three terms – six years – on City Council. Seven terms – 14 years – as mayor. When McCrory won as mayor the first time, our basketball team was the Hornets and our football team was playing its first season. In Clemson.
McCrory hands in his slip and another poll worker walks him to one of the voting machines lined up in the gym of Myers Park Traditional Elementary. “How does it feel not to be on the ballot?” a voter asks him.
“It's different,” McCrory says. “It's different.”
He expected to be voting on this day from Raleigh, as governor. He ran last year as a veteran mayor with a nationwide profile, a moderate Republican record and good hair. He took a whipping from Lt. Gov. Bev Perdue. He couldn't even carry Charlotte.
McCrory says Perdue spent more money on the ground and Barack Obama had long coattails. He says he's over it. But then he says he might run again. In a 45-minute stretch, he mentions the governor's race eight times. “That's a tough knot in the stomach,” he says.
He doesn't want to talk a lot about the specifics of his time as mayor. He says it's a day for the two candidates, John Lassiter and Anthony Foxx. He says he's proud he served without a scandal, and he's proud of the work he did in tough times – the deaths of police officers, the sinking economy, ice storms, drought.
He also says he's proud of leading with vision. His vision is stamped all over the city – the new arena, the NASCAR Hall of Fame and the Lynx train that draws a straight line from Charlotte's present to its future.
McCrory served more than a decade, but in some ways we won't know how he did until 20 years from now, when we look at what he helped build, and we look at the bills, and decide if it was worth it. (It's also too soon to tell if Tuesday's election says anything about McCrory. He supported Lassiter. Foxx won.)
He votes and leaves the gym, and out in the hallway there's a kindergarten class. The teacher sees the chance for a quick civic lesson: “Class, this is our mayor, Mr. Pat McCrory!”
All of a sudden the charm kicks in. He's asking the kids about school, wrestling with a couple of boys in the back, accepting hugs and high-fives. “I'm about to be replaced,” he says. “Just like you'll be replaced by new kindergartners next year. But guess what! You'll be going to first grade!”
On the way out, I mention that if he runs for office when he's 70, he's got that kindergarten class locked up.
He looks over, and he's smiling, and the jet lag is gone from his face.
“That's the thing,” he says. “You never know.”
