ASHVILLE - You could gauge the ebb and flow of the election by the sounds that cascaded through hotel lobbies and out into the streets last night.
After a day of desultory enthusiasm, the Al Gore stalwarts came alive during happy hour, dubbed ''attitude adjustment'' in the bar of the Sheraton. At the Capitol Grille next door, diners dropped their forks and whooped at the word that their man had taken Florida. Upstairs at the bar of the Heritage Hotel, they shrieked again when Michigan came in. The third piece of the treasured trifecta, Pennsylvania, drew a roar that cascaded up the atrium of the Sheraton.
By 8 p.m., the mood in the city had been transformed from edgy angst into genuine optimism. Crowds began moving toward the entrances to the War Memorial Plaza, where the Gore rally took place. Families toting beach chairs, and children on their fathers' shoulders, took to the grassy slope overlooking the plaza to watch history.
An hour later, the euphoria was tempered by the news that Florida was back in the undecided column. Democratic National Committee chairman Edward Rendell conceded there was still a long way to the magic 270 electoral votes. ''It's not a slam dunk,'' he said.
The reality set in for some that, as advertised, it was going to be a long night. But such distinctions were lost on most of the crowd, still surfing the good vibes of the earlier news.
''I felt really bad when I got up this morning but it all turned around,'' said Carol Key, who was in the crowd with her husband Kevin and their two children. ''But I got excited at the last minute and figured we ought to be here.'' Key likes Gore so much that she wrote his name in over Michael Dukakis and George Bush in the 1988 election.
Tish Owen, who reads tarot cards for a living, couldn't use her special powers to determine the winner. ''I'm too emotionally involved,'' she said. ''People called me all day asking me about it and I told them I can't use the cards because I can't be objective.''
Owen, a self-described ''yellow dog Democrat,'' still worried about the outcome. ''I don't ever remember being this nervous about an election,'' she said, furious about Gore's loss in Tennessee. ''My grandmother would spin in her grave. God, that makes me mad. I can't believe he lost his own state.''
As the race shifted back and forth during the night, euphoria competed with the specter of bad news lurking in the thick Southern night. Country diva Kathy Mattea and fiddler extraordinaire Mark O'Connor were on hand to keep up the crowd's spirits.
Earlier, the issue on Gore supporters' minds was getting out the vote. ''Everyone's counting on a light minority turnout,'' said Ronda Rogers, a gift shop cashier who voted for Gore early yesterday. ''But you should have seen the lines this morning. I've never seen such a minority turnout.''
Then came The Night of the Long Wait. It was an exercise in patience, fortitude, and faux jocularity.
Some 7,000 people - 1,500 credentialed media alone - packed the plaza last night to go the distance. Thousands more spilled into the streets. The War Memorial Plaza is a Nashville classic, a staple of political fests in these parts for decades. Gore's father was eulogized here. This was where the Democratic candidate would make his stand.
Early in the week, reporters blanched to learn that the rally would be held at the plaza. It is, after all, outdoors, and it was pouring at the time. If Gore stalwarts were happy to get wet for a good cause, the media were less enamored with the idea. But the weather yesterday was tropical by Yankee standards - a good omen for anyone who believes in them.
For most of yesterday, Nashville lacked the emotional charge one would expect for the possible election of a native son to the White House. It went about its business as if it were just another work day.
''I'm afraid that's what it is, dear,'' confirmed one elderly woman on her way to work, unfazed by the election.
There was none of the boisterous confidence rumored to be gripping Austin. There was no forest of signs downtown, no volunteers on street corners urging people to vote.
''Nashville used to be a small town,'' said Paul Whitehead, a classical music producer. ''It still is a small town.''
But that didn't begin to plumb this stillness. Bush supporters walked the streets with impunity. Gore, they said, is too liberal for this state. Besides, he's not a true native son. ''He was born in Carthage but he grew up in Washington,'' said Ron Mankoboe, an attorney who voted for Bush.
Another Bush supporter chortled at the prospect of a possible Gore loss in his home state. ''It would tickle me to death,'' he said.
Even some Gore stalwarts conceded their man had lost touch with his home state. They pointed to his apparent obliviousness to the political shift in Tennessee within the last decade toward the Republican Party. Gore of all people, they said, should have known to work this state harder.
''That message appears to have been lost on the campaign,'' said Courtney Hollins Edington, a Nashville lawyer and Gore volunteer. ''They needed to do more here.''
If the worst were to have happened, Gore supporters could always have looked at the bright side. There is no finer city in which to mourn. Nashville, after all, is home to country music, which memorializes tragedy. Where else can you find a bar with a name to match the Liquid Lounge? Where else can you find a T-shirt emporium with winners like ''If I throw a stick, will you go away?''
