With November looming around the corner and both the Republican and Democratic conventions this coming week, they are coming down to an end of an epic race. Trump announced his running mate as Mike Pence, who is anti- woman, anti-immigrant, and anti-gay rights and might actually be a worse candidate than Trump, and Clinton announced Tim Kaine as hers. At this point, it's a hard truth to swallow that the candidate that I wanted to be in the White House is no longer in the race, or even an option for a running mate, and that the two people who no one took seriously or predicted to make it this far are now some of our only choices.

It's hard not to be involved in politics because everyone truly has their own opinion about it no matter what they say, and the people I have been talking to about the election have told me things like "I'm just not going to vote" more times than not, and I'm here to say that shouldn't be an option for you or anybody else. It physically makes me mad when I hear someone say they aren't going to vote because they don't like the options they were given. We are fortunate enough to live in a country where most of us have a say in society and are able to cast our vote for things we want done or changed; we live in a republic and we are all extremely fortunate to be doing so. To those of you who argue that your vote does not matter and that nothing gets passed anyways, the LGBTQ bill would never have been passed if there were not people who were diligently getting others to vote to get everyone the rights to marry the person that they love, or the recent Texas abortion law that was struck down. Things happen, maybe not as quickly as we would all like, but I cannot stress how important it really is to cast your vote in this election.

If you believe that choosing between Trump and Clinton might as well be choosing between lethal injection and and suicide, don't worry! There are other options for you! Jill Stein is running as the Green Party candidate and Gary Johnson is running as the Libertarian candidate, and if you have been paying attention to the news, Ted Cruz choose not to endorse Trump at the Republican convention and said that he believes that we should vote down the ticket and who we align our views with. There are ways to make your voice be heard even if you do not believe that it actually is.