A Young Man’s Sense of History
Last night, around 12:30 a.m. CT, our only son called. He had just returned from Grant Park in Chicago where he had stood shoulder-to-shoulder with that crazed mass of people who were fortunate enough to be on the grounds when Obama delivered his victory speech.
Dad, of course, wanted to know how close Son was to the stage: 150 feet? 200? More? Mom wanted to know if Son had seen Oprah or Jesse Jackson. But Son would have none of either of our moderately stupid parental questions. He didn’t know. He couldn’t tell. He was just happy (and yes, overwhelmed) to have been there, at that time, in that place.
After reaching work this morning, a bit later than usual, I received a snide email from one of my hard-right, conservative friends. He was attempting to be funny, to lighten the election results with a tired joke. Maybe I’ve lost my sense of humor, but I couldn’t laugh. I found the joke petty and sad, and I deleted it without reply. Later — it might be today, or tomorrow, or next week — I’m sure one or both of my parents will talk about how saddened they were to see McCain lose, how much they now fear for the country.
I wish all of them could remove the cynicism from their DNA, for just a moment, put politics aside, and respect the importance of what just happened.
I wish they could see the world through the eyes of our son, who couldn’t care less about ideologies or jokes; about how close or far he was from the stage or whether or not he spotted a celebrity.
I wish they … I wish we could all just celebrate this moment with a young man who will never forget when he stood with thousands in Chicago, and millions nationally, and billions globally — and, without shame, without hesitation, confessed awe at the significance of this second on history’s grand scale.
4 Responses to “A Young Man’s Sense of History”
As someone who voted against him, I can say I was proud yesterday. But as someone who is younger and always thought I would see a black president, it wasn't as surprising for me. For me, I just didn't like Obama's policies and liked McCain more. So that's why I understand the sadness and big loss after a long campaign where our guy lost. I would think Pete as a former GOPer you would understand that.
Saying that, McCain is right we need to come together and Obama will be my president.
*opens umbrella*
OK ,here I come to rain on the parade.
In the interest of protecting our new President from acts of racial hatred that no doubt will be bubbling afresh in the squirming brains of the bigot-minded, let's not focus on the race issue, even now. MMmmm K?
He made it. The worst worst worst thing we could do is have a “blacks won the Whitehouse” festival. We need to be humble about it, but neither subdued either. The best bet to further racial equality would be to give the historical aspect a passing mention and then act like we should: people who expect a good job from this new President regardless of how good he tans.
He was raised in a white household. I have a great deal of difficulty anyway, and always have seeing him as a true representative of oppression against slave-descended blacks. Let the man just be who he is, intelligent, competant and passionately committed to changing the infrastructure of this crumbling country.
Let that be his call to fame, his legacy and not the goddamned color of his skin.
We need to move away from that…See? That's where racism begins and ends, it's a skin infection..
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