Change

January always brings in all this talk of change and new beginnings. A zillion diet ads. Resolutions. Blah, blah, blah. A new President...that does too. But this one is quite special. Historic. An overused word in my opinion, but for once in my life it is not hyperbole. It is just right. After 8 dark years of bad decisions, greed, and fear (frosted on top with the rhetoric of patriotism) our country has chosen a different path, and I'm proud and excited by the collective national choice to elect Obama.

Growing up in Detroit in a primarily white neighborhood (primarily because we lived there!), I was raised around White people and Latinos (i.e. all my relations)* who were openly scared of Black people. As a child, I found it puzzling the power that this fear had over them. A black person driving down a street would result in worried and fearful conversations about why they were here and that they not return with more Black people. I got stoned by kids outside my elementary school yelling the N word at me. When I met my first black school-mate my internal reaction was "it sucks to be you." White people (the folks running the show) do not like your people. In the pitiless racial hierarchy that is America, I knew that she was at the bottom, and I felt bad for her. If I got stoned, what on earth had she endured? We never talked about such things.

In some leap of faith, these folks and many others elected Barack Obama. Maybe some of the boys who pelted me with stones until I ran home voted for him. Perhaps some of our former neighbors, who we still keep in touch with and visit when in town, did too. I know my nuclear family voted for him, and maybe even some of the Detroit clan did too.

I sometimes wish I was in DC to witness this all in person, but knowing what an average inauguration does to the city in terms of crowds and gridlock, I would not subject myself to that, not even for President Obama. Actually the deciding factor is the January weather I know so well. It's dreadful 99% of the time. There is generally an icy biting cold, sometimes with sleet or snow. It is not the kinda of weather you want to be standing in for hours on end. If God continues to smile down on us, maybe She'll send DC a clear, sunny and brisk day for all the hopeful and determined souls on the Mall.

So I shall watch my new President swear in on TV like the rest of the world. I'm hoping that our office brings out the TV set into the conference room so we can gather around and watch together.

I don't have illusions that he will walk on water or that all the national ills will melt away with so much unity and hope on that day. I do know that a big barrier has been breached forever. Something monumental has shifted in our national psyche to get us to this day. For people of color all over the world (and certainly for this particular one) there is a sense of possibility and hope I cannot put into words.

*that my family and most Latinos have African blood is just one of those complex topics I'll save for another post.