Tuesday was an historic day in our history. As young adults, not many of us have previously been around for so much political excitement. I felt proud to be an American as I cast my vote Tuesday morning, and I hope everyone else also voted.

But as I look back on Tuesday night, I feel conflicted about two aspects of the celebrations that happened.

I’m going to give the bad news first. I was disappointed with the lack of options on campus for people who wanted to follow the election results coming in.

I stopped by the afterHOURS event, and was impressed by the slideshow, but there were too many people and not enough space to move around.

I was with a friend who was equally interested in watching the results, so I told her the TVs on the first floor of the Curry Student Center would probably be tuned into one of the major news stations. We traveled up the flight of stairs only to find that the TVs were actually on a sports channel and that there was a college football game on.

I wonder why the Red Sox get more attention than the presidential election. Last year when the Red Sox were in the World Series, there were celebrations throughout the Curry Student Center. These events, for every game, included big screen projections of the game and tons of free food. Why not have equal treatment for this one-night event?

On to the good news that came from last night. It was only by coincidence that I was with a few friends in an apartment on Huntington Avenue near the Prudential Center when Barack Obama was announced the president-elect. I watched John McCain give his concession speech and Obama speak at a little before midnight. I was moved by both speeches.

But what moved me more was what followed and it was not something that happened on my friend’s TV, but outside her window.

It started when we heard yelling coming from outside. We looked out the window to see droves of people running to the reflecting pool outside the Christian Science Center. We could not see the action happening, but our interest was peaked. We went downstairs to see what all of the commotion was about.

We were expecting celebrations, but I was in no way prepared for what was really happening.

Hundreds of people, mostly college students, were surrounding the reflecting pool. Many were also swimming in the pool. There were also chants ranging from “O-BAM-A” to “U-S-A.”

It was at this moment that I not only, for the second time that day, felt proud to be an American, but I was also proud to be a college student.

The youth vote, after years of underperforming, made a difference Tuesday. We voted in huge numbers and then felt we had the right to celebrate.

As I left the reflecting pool area Tuesday night, Boston Police officers were piling out of white vans near Symphony Hall. As reported by The News today, nobody was arrested during the celebrations last night. We had all exercised our right as Americans to vote earlier that day and once Obama won, we decided we had a right to celebrate.

Here’s to four amazing years. Never forget how you felt last night.

– Ashley Traupman is a senior journalism major and member of The News staff.