The limits of possibility have been widened considerably

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Two hundred twenty-one years ago, the Founding Fathers wrote into the U.S. Constitution that slaves were to be counted as three-fifths of a human being in the representative democracy that was being born.

Last night, I wept openly as I watched a photograph of Barack Obama posted alongside these words:  The 44th President of the United States of American.  I knew something would get me going, and that was it…but then so much else kept it flowing.

150,000 in Grant Park, Chicago…how I longed to be there with them!

Barack, Michelle, Sasha, & Malia Obama walking on to the stage- our new First Family.

Jesse Jackson with tears streaming down his face.

People of every background crowded together in Times Square, not only celebrating a new year, but a new era.

The crowds to the north, in Harlem- fathers with sons, mothers with daughters, explaining the history of such a moment.

Even John McCain, eloquently and graciously conceding.

And I thought to myself, “What isn’t possible, if you continue to work hard, pursue new avenues, maintain the flame of hope…what isn’t possible?”

This man, Barack Obama, inspires me, and I am proud to call him my President, and I am proud to call this my country.

Sweet Caroline at the YWCA

 

I had to read the e-mail five or six times yesterday, this news that Caroline Kennedy was coming to our local YWCA.  If I lived in a borough of New York City, I would not consider this to be the stuff of late-breaking news; I’m told that she takes the bus there.  But I reside five hundred miles to the west, just on the periphery of what can be considered greater Cleveland.  It is home to me, but I am realistic about how hot this little spot is to most people.   So you’re tellin’ me that four blocks from my workplace, less than one mile from my house, we’re to have an audience with something close to American royalty?  O.K., I’m a little starstruck.

But it is now more than that, some six hours after the fact.  I’ve seen her in the sturdy old Y building where I go for board meetings, experienced her eloquent and honest speech, grasped her hand and spoken face to face, even grabbed an autograph.  What means the most now is knowing that she cares about the things that I care about, because knowing that fosters a feeling of cultural kinship, even if we are worlds apart in the details of our two lives.  What I heard her say tonight, it resonated- the importance of solid public education; the absolute necessity of our unity as Americans when it comes to caring for each other, our country, and our world; the difficulty of turning away from one candidate that you long thought you would vote for (Clinton) in favor of another (Obama) because you came to believe that he better spoke to the needs of this nation and world; the echoes you heard of your own father’s voice, echoes growing louder with each person who mentioned that they had seen no one else generate this sense of hope and excitement in the forty-some years since.   I heard this bright and poised woman say all of these things, and they made sense to me.

Thank you, Caroline, for coming our way.