The form is straightforward enough until one comes to the... [Derived headline]

The form is straightforward enough until one comes to the section headed:

Date You Left Canada and Date You Intend to Return to Canada

(9) Date I left Canada Year Month Day

(To vote, you must have lived outside Canada for less than five consecutive years.)

Note: the preceding sentence in parentheses is part of the application form, not something I added)

And then:

(10) I intend to return to live in Canada by Year Month

Puzzled by the latter question, I dialed the Elections Canada help line, and it immediately was answered by a very helpful man.

"I'm at the part of the application that asks when I intend to return to live in Canada," I told him. "But what if my answer is, I have no idea?"

"That's not a problem," the helpful fellow said. "Technically, it's a requirement, but pragmatically, it's not something that we check."

But you do have to be honest about precisely when you abandoned Canadian residence, I learned, unless you are a Canadian diplomat, a member of the Canadian Forces, or, according to the application form, "an employee of a federal or provincial public administration posted outside Canada." Those people can stay away forever and still not lose their votes.

"Is it good enough if I just walk across the Rainbow Bridge at Niagara Falls for 15 minutes and say I'm back in Canada?" I inquired.

"We need something with your name and address on it that shows you've been back for, like, a month," I was told.

The central issue, according to Elections Canada, is that "Canadian citizenship does not mean automatic eligibility to vote."

This stands in stark and somewhat dispiriting contrast to the policy of many other nations, including the United States, which allows most of its citizens who live beyond its borders to vote in federal elections until they die, and even longer if they're from Chicago.

No one knows how many potential Canadian electors live in the United States. In 2009, a total of 814,965 American residents listed Canada as their country of birth, according to the U.S. Census Bureau -- that's more than Jamaica but fewer than Cuba.

Not all of those folks are of voting age, of course, and many have been here for more than five years. In addition, there must be thousands of naturalized Canadians who, like the multinational Abels of Maryland, were born in such foreign villages as Moscow and Flatbush.

Meanwhile, in Burlington, Ont., a former Lutheran minister and life-long peace advocate named Ken Sherman is preparing for another round of vigorous campaigning in Canada on behalf of Barack Obama.

Sherman, a native New Yorker who moved to Canada when his French-born wife joined the faculty at McMaster University, is the international chairman of Democrats Abroad, an organization that chases votes from five- or six-million Yanks in dozens of countries. There is a group called Republicans Abroad that is equally fervent.

"We're like the 51st state party," Sherman said, "and in many states, we have proved to be the deciding factor."

As proof, he cited the recent election of Al Franken to the United States Senate from Minnesota, noting that the former Saturday Night Live comedian prevailed by only 300 votes and that he was not certified as the winner until more than 3,000 ballots from Canada and other far-flung dominions were duly opened and counted.

Back to the purple paperwork. What happens if a wandering Canadian does certify that he has been away for less than five years and that he intends to come home soon?

One receives a thick envelope in the mail from Ottawa. This contains three more envelopes, an instruction sheet, an OFFICIAL SPECIAL BALLOT PAPER SUPPLIED BY THE CHIEF ELECTORAL OFFICER, and a slip of paper in a lovely shade of aubergine that says IT'S UP TO YOU!

With this in hand, one then calls Elections Canada or searches on the Internet for the names of the candidates in his or her former riding. For example, in Toronto's Don Valley West, a neighbourhood to which I probably never will be able to afford to return, I can choose between a Liberal, a Tory, a New Democrat, a Green and a Communist.

To vote, one fills in the OFFICIAL SPECIAL BALLOT PAPER, places it into the INNER ENVELOPE and seals it, places the INNER ENVELOPE into the OUTER ENVELOPE and seals, signs and dates it, places the OUTER ENVELOPE into the PRE-ADDRESSED MAILING ENVELOPE, affixes a stamp, and then trusts the United States (or Zanzibari, or Fijian) Postal Service and Canada Post to get it to Coventry Road in Ottawa before 6 p.m. on May 2.

"I don't think a voter is any more ignorant of the political process in his home country if he lives abroad," said Ken Sherman, the worldly Democrat.

Canada, on the other hand, denies the franchise to anyone who has been gone for more than 60 months, apparently in the belief that diplomats and soldiers have a longer attention span than anyone else.

On behalf of those of us who have been gone for less than five years, I called Canada's major political parties and asked if they intended to actively court the cross-border vote. (I didn't phone the separatists. If there is a Bloc de l'Outre-Mer, I'll be impressed.)

Chris Day of the Conservative campaign replied in an email: "We don't comment on campaign strategy. We do, however, encourage all Canadians who are eligible to vote to do so."

Kate Purchase of the Liberals called back and said, "The Liberal Party hopes to engage Canadians in Canada but also around the world in this very important election."

She said that outreach beyond the borders was "typically taken by individual ridings; there isn't a central process."

And she noted that the Liberals, should they gain power, plan to develop an online voting process for diplomats, government employees, and Canadians studying abroad.

I was too polite to ask Ms. Purchase how her leader used to answer question (10).

Allen Abel is a Brooklyn-born Canadian journalist based in Washington D.C.