Timely

We just finished watching "The Great Debaters" last night, based on the true story of tiny Wiley College, an all-black school in Marshall, TX.  Denzel Washington plays Melvin Tolson, professor, secret Union organizer and later poet who started the college's first debate team.  They go undefeated and become the first black team to ever debate a white team in the country, then later face the national champions at Harvard University.  There are some really potent scenes about what it was like to be African-American living in the South back then.  In one scene, the president of the college, Dr. James Farmer, Sr. has to bow down and apologize to some white poor farmers (who are completely uneducated) for running over their pig.  In another scene the team gets lost on a Texas back road and drives up on a just-completed lynching, with the corpse still smoldering from it's post high above everyone's head.  They barely escape when the group spots them, and the event changes everyone in the car forever.  

To go from this movie to today, when our country had its first African-American President sworn in, has been a very moving experience.  I've been carrying the weight of how monumental this is all day, but it feels good.   President Obama may not have been the most experienced person for the job, but I think he is smart enough to surround himself with experienced people in areas where he may be lacking.  I think I'm joining many people today in feeling much less jaded about politics than I have in a long time.  I actually feel like a miracle has occurred, and I played a very small part in making it happen.  I feel proud that this man got elected to lead us, and happy that people in nations all over the world are expectant about what kind of a difference this new leadership will bring to the world.  But I feel hope more than anything.  Hope for my son's future, my nation's future and our planet's future.  And it feels good.