Yes We Did

It’s taken me a while to fully digest what just happened on November 4. I can’t remember the last time I felt so GOOD about voting, about having helped make a difference for a political campaign that I truly believe will help change the face of America… and change it for the better. It was surreal watching the returns come in and then finally witnessing Keith Olbermann call it for Obama shortly after 10 p.m. It’s really difficult to put those feelings and, indeed, the feelings I still have, into words. I’m just… happy. And hopeful. I can’t say I’ve ever felt this good after a presidential election EVER. Granted, it’s only the third time in my life that the candidate I voted for actually *won*, but that’s beside the point. The other two times—Reagan in ‘84 (I know, I know… but I was 18 and still heavily under the conservative political influence of my parents) and Clinton in ‘92—left me just feeling like I had done the right thing but minus that feeling of true satisfaction in having voted for someone I truly believed in. (In case you’re wondering, I voted for Ralph Nader in ‘96, a choice that I do not regret as I came to not particularly like Bill Clinton [although not quite enough to vote Republican, that's for damned sure], but I will never vote for him again.) I’m also truly happy for my son, who got to witness his first presidential election (OK, technically it was his second, but he was only a year old during his first), and even though he’s still way too young to understand any of the political implications, at least he was able to witness history in the making… I just hope it’s a memory that he will be able to retain his entire life. I am also proud that he will grow up knowing this man as President Obama, instead of just a footnote in history as the first serious African American political contender for president. Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like Missouri was able to flip to blue as several of the other states did this time around (this won’t become official until all of the provisional ballots are counted), but it feels good knowing that we live in a city where eighty-four percent of the vote went to Obama while McCain only garnered sixteen percent. Not to mention it also feels DAMNED good to live in a country where Obama beat McCain by a whopping six points, the largest margin of victory for a presidential candidate since Reagan won in 1980. So yeah, it feels damned good knowing now that, yes, we did it.