OK, so my family life lately is in shambles. My husband supports John McCain and I vehemently support Barack Obama. My two college students, liberal and wonderful, side with me. Our two cats, I'm afraid, could be the swing votes in our personal red state-blue state wartorn household. And these days, they're the only allies my husband has.

How did this happen? I'm not exactly sure, but somewhere along the way, my liberal journalist husband went to work on Wall Street. The money was good, the household budget was flush, and our kids benefited from a lovely suburban life. Then he got the Republican gospel. He voted for George Bush not once, but twice. I, on the other hand, rented Michael Moore videos and recalled for my then-teenagers how I was carried out of the ROTC offices at my college by the police. My kids were, like, "Wow, Mom. Ancient history." Yawn. 

OK, so maybe I'm a died-in-the-wool, bleeding heart liberal. But I'm also a woman with a 21-year-old daughter and a 19-year-old son on the cusp of their adult lives. You could call me a bra-burning women's rights advocate, but I need my bra desperately right now. Even though I was able to admit for a time that John McCain was a decent man, that changed when he added Sarah Palin to his ticket. On the night of Palin's infamous speech at the GOP convention, my husband jumped up and proclaimed: "She's a force of nature!" At that very moment, a line was drawn in the sand separating his Barcolounger from my spot on the couch.

It was war. I pulled out the big guns. I donated money to the Obama-Biden campaign. I joined Obama's YouTube page and became his Facebook friend. I ordered Obama "Hope" buttons for me and my kids. I put an Obama-Biden bumper sticker on our brand new Infiniti. And I ordered "Lipstick Wearers for Democrats" bumper stickers for all the women in my office. I'm not even a Democrat, but an Independent voter.

My husband, bless his heart, was tolerant in the face of all this opposition. Even though he's apparently morphed into a Republican, he still believes in free speech.But that includes his free speech, which he exercises regularly by sending me emails at work, with the subject lines "interesting" and "read this," all linking to news and opinion pieces meant to discredit the Obama campaign. And I have been forced to endure endless nights of the Fox News Channel.

Of course, now that Obama seems to be safely ahead in every poll I've hungrily scanned, I feel a bit badly about my behavior. My husband has begun to sulk a bit, and isn't half as haughty as he was, say, about six weeks ago. So I've toned down the "I am woman, hear me roar" persona and managed to restrain my glee. But it's been a challenge. 

I think we've finally reached the "detente" phase of this family war. We're both learning how to respect each other's opinions, keep our fiercest stands to ourselves, and only glare at one another during televised debates. In fact, we watched the final debate together and survived unharmed. This skirmish will end soon enough and family harmony will certainly return -- right? I'm counting the days until Nov. 5th.