Happy Election Day!

I haven't written much on the blog about politics. I feel I have to write today because this is historical and I want my kids to know how I've felt the last 20 months watching all of this.

A lot of you know how much I've been into Obama (drank the Kool Aid if you will). He got my attention at the Democratic Convention in 2004 and I thought, "he could be President someday." And lo and behold, here we are now.

Several days out of the past 20 months stand out in my mind. The first - I was able to go to his rally in Denver back in February at University of Denver. I waited in line for a couple of hours and it was pretty cold that day. The train to DU was so full I almost didn't get on (trains are usually not full in Denver or at least they weren't at that time). There were so many people at the rally that everyone didn't get in. I believe there were 14,000 people inside and many more still out on the Lacrosse field where you could see him via big screens. As we were shuttled inside, Amanda and I almost got pushed into a practice gym. We managed a way out and literally ran to find a seat in the main arena. Good thing, the practice gym was, in fact, overflow and he did talk to that crowd for a bit but we were in the main place. Caroline Kennedy spoke, which was a surprise. The Kennedy's had just endorsed him the day or two before, so it was super exciting to see her as well. The day was thrilling, inspiring and made me feel like a true part of history.

The 2nd day I remember was when I got a chance to caucus. Yes, Colorado is a caucus state. I drove down the street to the high school down the road and realized how big this election really was. The parking lot (which is huge) was already filling up. There was a line of cars waiting to just get in the lot. (I've driven by when school is getting in and it is not that busy even then.) It was just the Democratic caucus location so all these people were just Democrats. I waded through a TON of people to find my little lunch table that was my precinct. There were literally only 22 people from my precinct there. (Hundreds in the cafeteria, but only 22 from my voting precinct.) We waited and read through all the rules (kind of scary how little we knew and that we were all in charge - democracy at it's best or worst depending on how you feel about it). By the way, I was in the very early days of my pregnancy with Dylan and was exhausted and nauseated and didn't get a chair. We raised our hands for Obama and Clinton and then they counted. It reminded me of voting in high school for your class president or something. The coolest part of the experience for me was when they counted the votes. It was 12 for Obama and 10 for Clinton. I was chatting with the girl next to me about the whole experience. We realized after the vote that our two votes made the difference of how many delegates Obama got. If we hadn't been there it would have been a tie. Shows how much your vote counts, especially for local races and primaries. Good lesson in democracy!

The third moment that was historical: Watching Obama get the nomination officially at the convention. I cried through most of Michelle Obama's speech, Ted Kennedy's appearance, Joe Biden's speech and then when I heard Hillary Clinton nominate him. It just made me realize how special this was. How great to see the first African American nominated to be the candidate for his party to be President! I made Zach watch even though he won't remember. He will, however, walk by the TV when Obama is on and say, "Look Mommy, Barack Obama." 9 times out of 10 he's correct. Sadly, sometimes it's Tiger Woods or another black man in a suit. Shows you how few people of color are on TV. He also thinks every referee is Granddad...could just be Zach's age too. :)

Finally, tonight. I saw Dixville Notch, NH (who were the drunk guys that came up with that name for a town) tally their votes and overwhelmingly vote for Obama. What a moment. Tomorrow will be so exciting - please God, I hope it goes the way I want. :) If not, I'll be in mourning for the next week or so. Please do not call me. :)

Although, I have to say I'm sad that his grandmother died tonight. It seems so unfair. His parents are both dead as well as his grandfather. All the people who worked so hard to raise him did not get to see this. It makes me tear up just thinking about it. It must be bittersweet. No matter how old we are we want our parents to be proud - no one will be there tomorrow that knew him as a baby. And to think your grandchild could be the first black man ever elected to President and imagine the bigotry they had to deal with while raising him, to not see it come to fruition??? Bittersweet. Thank goodness he was able to see her in her last days.
I'm glad I got to write this down so I will remember how this affected me and my kids will be able to read this someday. I hope that they will read this and not really understand what a big deal this is because they will have seen several nationalities, genders, etc elected to President and upper levels of government. Seriously, God bless America! What a great place to live!
GO VOTE!