I cannot stop crying. I am stunned. Barack Obama is the next president of the United States of America, and I cannot stop crying. America closed the deal. Yes, we did. It is hard to focus right now. My mind is traveling sporadically. I am in Jax, Florida, being hugged by Family, friends, neighbors and strangers I met during the primaries. I am trembling at my Dads bedside moments after he passed away on my birthday March 28, 2008. I've been going through my thoughts, one after another, trying to figure out the right words I want to use to express the thoughts I've had since my dad passed. And the main problem that I've come to is that there are just way too many things to choose from.
Choosing from those memories are a task, because how do I possibly put into words a description that can even possibly come close to expressing to the world about the man who is responsible for everything I am today? I wish my dad could have been here with me to witness this historical night. I am exhausted. I am restless. I am America. This is happening. We shook the world. We won. Last night, at five past 11, a collective roar made its way across living rooms and restaurants and the streets of cities and towns. Strangers sought each other out to hug one another and share in this moment.
At my own watch party, chants of "Yes we can!" And what a ride this has been. The manner of this campaign is as important as its ultimate outcome. Grassroots organizing met peer-to-peer networked technologies, learned from old school campaigning and was remixed through new school art. And it won. We won! Our new president. Our new president, Barack Obama, truly represents us, America and the world.
He is Kenya and Hawaii. He is Chicago and Kansas, and through his gifts, his timing and his blessings, we have risen to a great occasion. This campaign was a fire that forged a president and a people, and we have emerged stronger for the trial. It is not simply that we chose an African American or a Democrat for our first post-baby boom leader, although those are all significant milestones. It is not simply that we chose a communicator and scholar and a man who so clearly demonstrates family values through the love and respect he shows his wife and daughters, although those too are significant milestones. It is not simply that we chose, but also that we rejected.
We rejected smears and race-baiting and Muslim-baiting and desperation. We rejected so much history and so many rules that have bound us to the way things have been and are supposed to be. We rejected fear. Most importantly, we rejected fear. Our better angels prevailed for one critical moment which can and will change forever the moments to follow. We said resoundingly that we are not afraid. We are not afraid of the world out there. We are not afraid of ourselves.
In rejecting that fear, we have shed something awful, at least for a time, and in so doing we have liberated ourselves. I am still crying, but they are tears of possibility for all that we are free to do and free to be.Yes, we did. I feel like we, as a nation, stepped back from the edge of the cliff leading to the Abyss. We have nowhere to go but UP. We have the opportunity to remake the government and ourselves as just, compassionate, and wise. Maybe it will take time to win over the greedy and the bigots. Maybe it will happen fast, like a tsunami wave. Who knows what happens when HOPE energizes a people? Yesterday I had faith as small as a mustard seed. Today I believe we can move mountains.
Comments are closed for this post.
