life, really, and a latte by Tayé Foster Bradshaw
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
YES WE DID...PRESIDENT ELECT BARACK OBAMA
I just returned home, it is midnight here in Kirkwood. I attended a huge party at the Chase Park Plaza Hotel on the Central West End. There were hundreds of people there. My entire family was there. My Obama children were there, all the college staff from the West County office that I have been feeding were there! It was an amazing night.
I saw America anxiously waiting for the results. We arrived around 8:30pm. The atmosphere in the room instantly energized me after a long few days. I could feel the energy. My youngest son saw his classmates from Kirkwood High School. He had just been out knocking on doors today to make sure people in our precinct got out to vote.
President Elect Obama ran a wonderful campaign. He had an awesome campaign manager and chieft strategist. The ground game was unprecedent. The people that made phone calls, donated, talked, knocked on doors, wrote articles, cooked, all of it mattered and all of it added up to today.
I was there. I witnessed history. I was a part of history. I am one of many.
This markes a new day in America. The world was watching. My son in Japan sent me a message at 10pm. The world stands with WE THE PEOPLE and said we were more than the things that divide us, we are more than red state and blue state as new President-elect always said, we are more than the fear that blanketed us like a stiff quilt. We are so much more.
I know the elders are smiling. I talked to my elderly uncle in California who walked the block with his walker at 5:30am. He voted in Los Angeles. And he told me "congratulations." To him and his generation and to the memory of Dr. King, of my dad, of all the ancients, I say, "thank you."
There were children dancing and I'm sure this will be a memory of just a great party, they may not fully understand, but I have the pictures to show them. We did it and now tomorrow, when our eyes open up on a new sunsrise in this country of possibilities, we will get ready for the work. When people come together, under a common purpose, greatness can be achieved.
Black women in the room were especially excited. Finally, our beauty, our grace, our poise, our intelligence, our love can be celebrated. Michelle Obama embodies the women I honor in Mocha Moms, in the sororities and social groups that groomed and poised us to be more than what the stereotypes said and the glamor magazines wouldn't allow. A beautiful black woman will be in the White House.
Yes we did! We did! Ordinary people, we made history.
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