12:55pm I voted a few days ago, and tool today off so I could help others vote in some way. I didn't do much. In fact I did much less than what was done to me.
I was asked a little after nine to pick up a lady, Charlene was her name and I guess she was about 65. She was sitting on her front porch in North Omaha, surrounded by a beautifully trimmed and manicured garden just a few weeks, maybe, past its prime. She told me she went out to empty lots and parks and found plants she liked, and she didn't really know what she was doing beyond that, just gathering what she liked. I said I'd like to see it in the summer.
Her polling place was Girls Inc on 45th Street. The parking lot was full and there were lots of cars parked on the street, and Charlene worried that a Brenda Council sign was too close to the polling place, that she sure didn't want anything to mess anything up, that there be nothing to cause any problems or raise any questions from the people who cause problems and raise questions. I just said I think it's okay.
She brought a chair with her, Charlene did, and it was a good thing. There was no one outside, but inside the line stretched from one end of Girls Inc to the other. There were a few white people, but it was mostly African Americans, and I went to the front of the line and asked what time those folks had arrived. "Eight thirty-five" a guy told me. It was now 9:28. I went back and told Charlene it's be an hour or so.. She knew some people and started talking to them, so I went outside and read a little and talked to a few older guys, and then I noticed how many of the people in line were probably as old or older than me, over 60, and I realized they were being patient and careful and cheerful, like they know someone was waiting to take something away but, goddammit, this time they weren't letting go.
Mari had said we'd probably be crying tonight as the returns came in. Well, I started tearing up about 10am. Here's why.
I had never done much, really: worked a little for RFK, went to Grant Park one night during the '68 Democratic Convention, out campaigning for Ernie Chamber in 1970 or '71, a few other little things. I'm a member of SGI, the world's foremost peace organization. Mostly, back in the day, I sang.
But it was like this was a big relief, a happy ending, a load off the shoulders. I just saw it as a long, long path, a hallway like the crowded one inside Girls Inc., from 1968 to November 4 2008, a light barreling through, people waving along the way, (who they were I don't know) and getting happier and happier the closer the light got to the present.
The past is being changed. It's being vindicated. It's being made whole.
And those songs echoed again.
"How many years must some people exist before they're allowed to be free?"
"Oh what a feeling just come over me,
enough to move a mountain, make a blind man see."
"Sing a song, full of the faith that the dark past has taught us.
Sing a song, full of the hope that the present has brought us.
And from maybe the greatest song ever: "Deep in my heart, I do believe we shall overcome someday."
I heard them all and I wanted to start singing them, but I knew I had no right to do that. The people in line did, if they wanted to, but they didn't want to: they were in the moment only.
On the way out - the weather was gorgeous - I told Charlene I wished I could be in Grant Park tonight -- for Obama's gathering -- and she was horrified. "You want your head beat?" she said. "The beat the heads of people trying to something different. You just vote and be happy."
So there are scars that even electing Barack Obama can't heal. Can't heal, maybe, but damn I'll bet we can transcend those scars so they won't matter so much any more.
One more song. (I'm a sentimental goofball, I know) (and a drama queen) (but, nonetheless:)
Far between sundown's finish an' midnight's broken toll
We ducked inside the doorway, thunder crashing
As majestic bells of bolts struck shadows in the
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1 comment:
And a month later...I'm crying again.
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