Obama Election

I wrote this, obviously, last February...

Today I went to the Presidential Inauguration of our 44^th president, Barack Obama. I was there. I was there. I watched as he swore to uphold our constitution and to defend our nation. I saw as he uttered “So help me god”. I watched Aretha Franklin sing “My Country Tis of Thee” and tears came to my eyes; all I could think of was Marian Anderson in 1939, singing on the steps of the Lincoln memorial because she was not allowed, due to segregationist policies, to sing in Constitution Hall. And here I was, witnessing a black woman singing on the National Mall; not unlike Marian Anderson, but this time, she was singing at the inauguration of a black man to the highest office in the county.

This things have happened in OUR lifetimes. When Marian Anderson was denied the right to sing in Constitution Hall, Dad was only four years away from being born. Today, we still endure racially prejudiced policies in our military, our work force, and our education system. And here I was today, standing a few hundred feet away from a man who has genuine potential to eradicate these obsolete, prejudicial, and violent unspoken policies.

This is that “one great thing” that Big Country sang about. This is the moment, this is the man, this is the nation that will finally rise, like a phoenix, out of the ashes of a war-mongering, ignorant, intolerant, and sexist administration. And I was a part of this- I will continue to be a part of this.

In his speech today, President Obama said that though we are a young nation, it is time to put our childish things aside. This rings true for my soul, for I’m afraid it’s rather overdue for me as well. I am a young woman, but it’s time for me to begin to repay the debt I have acquired over these 24 years of my privileged and protected life. There are people suffering, in front of me. I see them every day when I travel into the District- people freezing under thin blankets, unable to find shelter, huddled in shapeless, colorless, faceless masses. There are people I don’t see, too. Suffering far away from me, in countries I can only dream of, from diseases I’ve been able to afford to be inoculated against.

Barack Obama has inspired me to stop hiding behind my whiteness- for years, the specter of my own harmful whiteness, specifically the privilege it came with, was almost too much for me to come to terms with.  I struggled with what I interpreted as the negative social and political ramifications of how my whiteness would be experienced by the people I most wanted to help. For me, these people are those affected by and infected with HIV/AIDS- a population in which people of color are grossly overrepresented. Today I saw myself not as a white woman, but as an American. And service to others, in the words of the President’s speech today, is “the price and privilege of citizenship”.

I can honestly say, I am a changed woman because of what I witnessed today. For that, I am and will forever be, deeply grateful.