"I admit it," my friend said to me last weekend. "I've drunk the Kool-Aid."

I was sticking with dry martinis myself, two olives. But I knew exactly what she meant.

She had bought into Barack Obama, she said. She seemed slightly embarrassed about it, because she is, by nature, a somewhat cynical woman. But you know what they say about cynics -- scratch one, and you find a person who wants to be convinced otherwise.

It takes a lot of scratching to get through this particular woman's skepticism. It's one of the things I appreciate most about her. She is normally the one who is most emphatically Not Buying It, whatever It is.

For instance, when everyone else in her circle was cheering Bill Clinton's first presidential victory, she was muttering that it was only a matter of time until he got caught doing something really stupid. You didn't have to be a psychic or a genius to have those kinds of nagging doubts, but even liberals with similar suspicions at least allowed themselves some time to celebrate and savor the win. Not my friend. She just rolled her eyes and shook her head.

She's had the same reaction to other characters and personalities who've swept to prominence on a wave of public optimism. Too many people, she'd say, were so eager to believe that positive change was coming, they let themselves be bamboozled by fast-talkers, crooks and phonies.

Yet Mr. Obama strikes her in a completely different way than other pols have in the past. His speeches really do inspire her, she said, a bit amazed to hear herself saying it, and that cannot be discounted.

If he can get her feeling that way, she figures, he can do it for other voters, maybe even enough to get himself a mandate. In which case, he might actually be able to accomplish something as president.

My friend's husband, normally more willing than she to extend the benefit of the doubt, is the one who's Not Buying It this time.

To him, Mr. Obama is too silver-tongued and facile, too self-referential and cocky. In his view, Mr. Obama has the campaigning down but lacks the weight to back it up.

Hillary Clinton, he says, is more tested and better prepared, someone who's earned the nomination with more time in the coal mines, while Mr. Obama seems to be sailing through on charm and momentum.

His wife, my friend, counters that even if Mrs. Clinton were to win, she'd be unlikely to get the kind of decisive margin required to break the Washington gridlock.

"I have to call your mom," she said, referring to my thoughtful, informed mother, whose explanations of who she's backing and why are always very well reasoned and grounded. "She's one of my bellwethers about how the country is going."

My mother has not drunk the Kool-Aid. Which isn't to say she doesn't like Mr. Obama; she does. She just likes Mrs. Clinton more. And, contrary to those who are urging the senator from New York to drop out of the race now, my mother hopes she'll hang in there long enough so that she can check off the Clinton box in the Pennsylvania primary in April.

The disagreement my friend has with her husband does not rise to the level of a family feud. They don't argue about it; each concedes the other's points to a degree, and both stand ready to vote for whomever wins the nomination.

This, I think, is the way it is in a lot of Democratic-leaning households right now. The candidates are so alike on the issues that people's alliances have formed based on other factors. And sometimes, the visceral nature of their reactions is pushing them to play against type. Thus, the cynic casts her lot with "hope and change," to a degree that even she can't quite believe.

On the other hand, she hasn't talked to my mother yet.