What I Did Today

Actually, the important thing I did today was watch the inauguration. I started a pair of mittens for Princess Gracie because mittens are something I've done a lot of and I didn't want to be distracted by a lot of pattern work and counting. I got pretty far even if I really wasn't paying much attention to it.

Today was a day like no other in the history of the United States. The significance is so profound it's hard to get my mind around it.

In 1968 I read the book, "Black Like Me" by John Howard Griffin. A non-fiction published in 1961 it relates how a white man dyes his skin black and spends six weeks traveling by bus and hitchhiking through the South. It's a story that shows the hate and prejudice that was so rampant in the South at that time. The book showed that there was a locked door for which there was no key if you were black. He was called names, not allowed in certain places, not allowed to fully function as an American. The book changed my life.

Today, Barack Obama took the key and unlocked the door. There is no longer a wall between people. By taking the oath of office, he not only unlocked the door, he tore down the wall.

People have argued with me, "A black man has had the right to become President for a long time." Yes, legally, but not in the hearts and minds of Americans. It took a financial crisis of epic proportions to force people to listen to a brilliant man who just might have some answers to get us out of this mess. I consider it a God thing, and I know some of my evangelical brothers and sisters might not agree, but God knows how stubborn and hard-hearted we can be so he had to provide us with a clear answer for this situation our government got us into. He just happens to be black.

Today, in Heaven, I think Abraham Lincoln, Rosa Parks, and Martin Luther King are dancing at their own inaugeral ball.

Tomorrow we'll go back to our regular lives. Politicians will fight again. Fox news will disagree with MSNBC. Jobs will still be scarce. Banks will still be in trouble. Kids will still need better medical care. But just for today, we'll act like real Americans and we get a chance to see what America is supposed to be, what our forefathers intended-"A government of the people, by the people and for the people ."

All people.