This year Washington state held its Democratic caucus on Saturday, February 9th. The caucuses started at 1 pm, and some didn't finish until nearly evening. Yours truly was the volunteer secretary for her caucus in Bellingham's 238 precinct, and it was also my very first time ever attending a caucus. My caucus lasted for four hours; it was an amazing experience.

Most of you that read the newsletter are probably old hat when it comes to caucuses, so the process may not seem so strange to you. But to see it for the first time this year, when so many more people, especially young people, turned out than were expected...it was certainly something. The room I was in was absolutely teeming with young people, most of them from the dorms on Western Washington University's campus. The coordinators from the county Dems had expected between 50 and 100 people to attend, but more like 300 actually came. There was no room to stand; we ran out of sign in sheets. The sheer number of young people wanting to participate in the process, just in my small precinct, was overwhelming. It was difficult to hear people, to explain, and the proceedings were fraught with misunderstandings. For the great majority of the people in the room, it was their very first experience with a caucus as well. It was messy and confusing and difficult to follow at times.

I loved it. It was organic and intimate and a beautiful example of how democracy must have begun centuries ago. Just a bunch of people arguing and trying to get along so that something could be accomplished. Our infinitely mysterious, complex, structured government was once just that simple.

In just my small precinct, turn-out since the previous election jumped over 2000%. In Washington state, over 600,000 votes were counted. No one could have predicted such a surge in activism, and much of that was caused by young people.

The cold hard facts are that Barack Obama took 52 of the delegates with 68% of the vote, while Hillary Clinton took 26 delegates and 31% of the votes during the Washington state Democratic caucus. But looking beyond the results, the caucuses this year were truly amazing. I applaud those of you who turned out, and I'm thrilled that I was able to be a part of such an incredible process.