I turned 18 on Jan. 4. It's not that remarkable a thing, and, in all honesty, the biggest thing I'm looking forward to is being able to vote — even if this year only features a school board election.

There are a lot of different ways to celebrate turning 18. An especially eccentric way to celebrate the new rights acquired might be to shoot a hole in a ballot while simultaneously smoking, scratching a lottery ticket and holding a copy of Playboy. I'm not that eccentric.

The only thing I did was buy a pack of Camel Crush cigarettes, which I gave away, still full, to my cousin, who apparently smokes them — although I don't think he prefers Camel Crush so much as he prefers free cigarettes.

A friend of mine went to Borders on his 18th birthday to buy a Playboy, with which his friend forced him to take a picture, probably to the dismay of the poor cashier. It'll probably be on Facebook soon.

Another of my friends hoped to get an anchor tattoo, but admitted to chickening out a bit, as I surely would if I were still considering my sister's idea of getting a tattoo that says "I hate needles." The infection would probably kill me before the irony would. At any rate, I'm not in it for the cigarettes, or the porn, or the lottery tickets, or the tattoos, or the guns. I'm excited about being 18 because now I can register to vote, which I plan to do as soon as possible.

I've always believed that voting is one of the most important things any American who hasn't committed a felony can do. People might say "one vote doesn't count," and it may not if everyone thinks like that.

Others — young people specifically — may say that they don't have the time to vote, and if that's the case, then they need to make time, because otherwise the Electoral College may as well be composed of retirees. Voting for the presidency wasn't even done by most of the public, nor were presidents anything but aristocrats until Andrew Jackson ushered in the era of the common man when he was inaugurated in 1829. Until the 17th Amendment was ratified in 1913, senators were chosen by state legislators.

The point here is that voting matters. And I deplore with every fiber of my being those who don't vote. People can celebrate their 18th birthday however they want, I don't care because what they do really only affects them. But not registering to vote or registering and not voting affects everyone in their congressional district, in their state and in their nation — or in the case of this year — their school district.

David J. Salazar is a senior at Santa Fe High School. You can reach him at davidjsalazar@gmail.com.