The Day After

I'm tired this evening, after staying up until 1:30 am to watch the remaining returns and the speeches. I don't think I have fully processed the enormity of what we, as United States citizens, have achieved by electing Barack Obama as our president.

When I logged into my email this morning I had two messages from non-American friends.

“Congratulations. Well done. Lot of work ahead” one wrote.
“Yes, yes there is” I replied.

I voted in my fifth Presidential election yesterday. J and I woke early and were in line to vote at 6:50 A.M. I passed the time before polls opened entertained by the looks of shock and dismay on the faces of poll workers and voters. They were surprised by the line.

There were three electronic voting machines available for use in my precinct. At 7:00 am the polls opened. At 7:05 one of the three machines broke down. At 7:10 I was at a machine, reading through my options.

I waited a few moments before pressing the vote button at the top of the machine.

Riding the buses into downtown and Squirrel Hill, I saw Obama supporters standing on street corners, holding enormous Obama/Biden 2008 signs and cheering. Cars honked as they passed by. The sun was shining and the spirits of the people out on the street was high for so early in the morning.

I went outside after lunch for a short walk. Instead of tension, the mood was festive, almost holiday-like. Young college students walked the streets proudly sporting I Voted Obama/Biden 2008 stickers.

It was dark when I left work, yet there were even more people out on the street, eating Ben & Jerry's ice cream. The bus stop was as crowded as I have ever seen it, enough people to fill two buses completely.

Instead of thinking about the election outcome, I thought about the Festival of Lights and wondered if the Cathedral of Learning was lit up. It was not, but the outside of the Carnegie Museum of Art sported a moose wandering across the facade.

Determined to stick to my media blackout plan, I stopped at the gym and went for a swim.

The plan lasted until 10:00 pm. J, curious about the results, pulled up CNN.com and began reading returns and projections to me out loud. Around 11:00 pm the Daily Show called the election for Obama and we switched to CNN to watch the speeches.

And I sat, stunned, until almost 1:30, watching the footage of U.S citizens celebrating in the streets.

Extraordinary.