Nothing Can Describe It

The feelings we all felt on Election Night are impossible to describe, and writing about it would fall into cliches. But I must share my personal experience.

As you must surely know, I had spent a good chunk o time Obama-ing myself. Putting in painful hours phonebanking into non-friendly areas. Or even worse, doing data entry on an extremely overburdened system that caused itself to restart after every single piece of data was entered. Canvassing in Ohio. Canvassing in Georgia. (Yes, we thought there was a substantial chance GA could go blue).

Days leading up to the election felt tense, and like every free second should be spent doing something for Obama.

The day before the election, CARE gave employees [Yes, I need to do a job update--lots more to say there!] half days off to do volunteering for your candidate of choice. Ariel joined forces with me, and we headed off to get ourselves mobilized. We were turned away at several outposts (where volunteers just weren't needed) before getting our assignments at the swanky Ponce outfit.

We traveled out a bit (I have no clue where we were, but surely Ariel does!) and began our door-to-dooring. While it's probably overall rare to be warmly received every time you bother someone at dinner time, I was almost completely warmly received. One woman even invited me in for dinner and insisted on giving me drinks. She couldn't vote (not a citizen) but her husband was a supporter. We were in friendly Obama territory. In a very diverse neighborhood of recent immigrants from Eastern Europe, East Africa, West Africa, and even Southeast Asia. Daaaaamn! It was cool.

Once finished, we headed back to Ponce HQ, where I met up with Ben, who was stapling papers like crazy. The energy was crazy, and never before had I seen so many people at the Ponce office. Hundreds of them swarmed about, moving in and out. In fact, in days before, the office had been unusually empty, and sometimes we barely crossed paths with other volunteers. So this pulsating Obama-pleasant-ness was so welcomed and appreciated by me.

Nov 4 was unbelievable. After work we skedaddled down to the Holiday Inn for Dekalb County Dem Party's Party. It was awesome. Hundreds--thousands?--of folks crammed into the hotels spaces. I of course joined in the urban line dancing (I can't remember the names of the songs) and we all snacked on the foods (which were, in all honesty, some variety of NASTY!), sneaking in some of the special beer we had brought along from home (such a potential celebration would call for great beer!).

The results started coming in, and lots of surprises were had. No contest on PA and FL...and when Indy and NC went to Obama, I just couldn't believe it. GA went to McCain by 5%. That was a disappointment, but a lot closer than it had been in a while.

Finally, west coast polls closed, and Obama was announced as the President elect. People were yelping--screaming--jumping up and down--crying. We were brought together in prayer (this makes me more uncomfortable in writing it than it felt in the moment). I started crying and was hugged--no, held--for at least 2 minutes by an older African American woman, who kept saying, Thank You Lord. All of us in the room were so in shock, so overjoyed.

Obama comes in with huge challenges, and he is a politician, after all. I have no question that he will stray from my political beliefs and even fail. But I have more hope in him than I have had in much at the Fed level before.

Obamanos!