Change is upon us

Barack Obama is the President of the United States. I'll say it again, because I'm not sure it has quite set in yet. Barack Obama is the President of the United States. It would be easy for me to say "I can't believe it," but the bottom line, the truth of the matter, is that I've been believing 'it' for well over a year or two now. I've followed Barack with every word, every sentence of every news article I could get my hands on. I would look and look and look for that one sentence that had the potential to thrust Barack Obama out of the stratospheric pedestal I held him in. It never came and the person I wished would lead this country was only further delineated with every speech given; every action taken. Through the nay-sayers, the pundits, the haters, the right-wingers, and even the wacked-out Hillary fans, I held my ground because I believed. I believed that simply by the way the man spoke, the eloquence of this speeches, the sound of his voice and his soothing intonation, ...that, was enough to tell me everything I needed to know about him. It was that glimmer of intelligence that attracted me in large part to what he had to say. Not a day has gone by where I'm not impressed by who this man is.

Now, today, he has been elected to be our 44th President. In one night of overwhelming news coverage of the election, the United States came to see exactly what is possible in this country. President Obama is the very personification of the American dream. When I was younger, my Father always told me that I could do anything I wanted to in life, as long as I put my mind to it. I believed every word, but somewhere along the way, somewhere in the last 8 years, I lost sight of that vision. That ambition. That vacancy was to become filled with mundane jobs, meager wages, and what I can only describe as an under-valuing of myself.

Seeing Barack on stage tonight with the whole world watching him speak, I realized my Father's words once more. He asks no more from all of us that our parents did when we started school and he touts the rewards made available by that very same hard work.

Earlier in the year, I wrote a blog where I coined a catch phrase for the year 2008. I said "hardcore GREAT in 08." And so far, this year has been really good to me in precisely the way in needs to be, right now. As for the future, 08 has become a springboard year for the acceleration of my ambition and a foundation of hope for the change that is to come.

Today I'm happy. Happy because I listened to all the phone calls from the rest of the world stream across the BBC last night. I'm happy because I know that our country can finally start healing from the last 8 years. I'm happy because I know that when my kids and and grandkids talk about the day the first African-American was elected President, I can say that I watched it all go down, and it was a great day across out country, ...a great day indeed.