Well there’s a lot to say about the past four weeks, during which I’ve found myself in London, Kyiv, Delhi, Chennai, Madurai, Kochi, New York, Connecticut, Philadelphia and Washington DC. Just a bit to be absorbed and described. I’ll start with Tuesday, the event shared with millions of others.
During the Democratic primaries one of the comments that used to annoy me was people saying they were going to vote for Clinton because “America’s not ready for Barack Obama”. And is America not ready because you’re not? I felt like asking (and sometimes did). Well, America was ready.
In a previous entry I said it can be dangerous to focus on “America” as a whole, projecting a single idea of what the country represents and in doing so brushing aside the experiences of those who don’t share the same idea. Yet in the last few days that sense of shared purpose has worked in an overwhelmingly positive way. Because, I guess, the idea of "America" that the majority chose to revive is one where every individual counts, regardless of background and beliefs.
Race didn’t feature as much as it might in the minute-to-minute struggle of the campaign. It’s now that the enormity of having a black President of the United States is sinking in. Beyond that message though, there’s the change Obama will bring in his approach to politics: listening carefully to all voices and through to the common purpose, and hopefully solutions, that lie beneath them; remaining calm, consistent and level-headed in the midst of tumultuous events; and strengthening the political process by bringing people back in.
Now off to see Man on Wire about Philippe Petit who tightrope-walked between the twin towers. "Nothing is impossible," says one of the people interviewed in the trailer.
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