I'm still mostly numb from the stunning victory that Barack Obama won last night.
I made calls for him. I gave money to him. I knocked on doors for him. I endured interminable, rambling conversations with my redneck relatives for him. I followed the polls every day and knew that it was likely that Senator Obama would sail on to victory. A small part of myself always felt like something would happen, that Democrats would somehow screw this up with infighting, that all our efforts were not enough.
I'm 26 years old and already struggling with a chronic illness. I've been out of work, sick and poor. I've had a child to worry about. I'm myself the child of ultra-cynical, ultra-conservative, ultra-religious parents who never spared the rod. I've never been able to vote for a presidential candidate I was proud of.
Hope comes hard.
Hope wormed its way into my heart, though. I caucused for John Edwards in Nevada, and when Edwards dropped out, I reverted to cynicism, predicting House and Senate races like I was playing fantasy football. I figured I would vote for whoever won the Democratic nomination, and I figured that someone would be Sen. Hillary Clinton. I figured we would loose the White House again, and I figured it would be dirty tricks on the Republican side that stole our victory.
Then I saw this video by Black Eyed Peas star will.i.am:
I am not ashamed to say that I cried. I still cry everytime I watch it. Something had broken inside of me, some wall had crumbled within me, and I dared to hope that there was a politician who might make good on the best and brightest promises that America makes to her children. I dared to believe that change was possible, not just in name, not just a return to the relative peace and prosperity of the Clinton years, but FDR style change that rocks our nation to its core and makes us rethink the social responsibilities incumbant upon all those who yearn after the American dream.
This speech melted the rest of the prophylactic ice that surrounded my heart:
I dared to think that my dream of America -- an America that looked beyond superficial divisiveness, an America where anyone could succeed through hard work, courage and cleverness -- lived as well in the heart of the esteemed Senator from Chicago. No, let me restate that. If I am to be honest, I will admit I was desperate to believe it. I cried again, and a new hope was born in me. We could have a president with a subtle mind, sense of duty, moral resolve and a heart thrown wide open to his fellow Americans.
My eyes misted over when NBC announced, around 7:30 PST that there was no way for Sen. McCain to win. I cried in earnest at his gracious concession speech. Please, I pleaded to whatever gods of politics were listening, please let this speech set the tone for Republicans everywhere.
I had pulled myself together and opened a bottle of wine by the time Obama's victory speech came on the air. He was presidential -- regal and full of gravitas. I managed to contain myself through almost half of the speech.
Then, the camera fixed on the face of Rev. Jesse Jackson, who was unabashadly letting tears stream down his face, and I completely lost my composure. Here was a man, I thought, who had real reason to cry. Every hope I had felt in the last eight months of the election, he had felt tenfold. Every political disappointment I had felt over the course of my lifetime, surely he had felt a hundred times over. The man who had once dreamed of being the first African-American president of the United States was finally bearing witness to a long overdue historical event; he watched a proud black man graciously and eloquently accept the duty of being the next President of the United States.
Though his emotion must have been orders of magnitutde above my own, I could understand a little what he felt. That made me think: if an old, black Reverend from the South and a 20-something, white pagan from the Northwest could feel moved to the same tears over one election, then perhaps there was hope for our nation, yet.