Mixed Heritage

President Barack Obama of the United States of America. Never thought I would hear such a phrase and it would be the truth. An exotic name for these parts and yet the people of America voted for him. A man whose father was African and whose mother is a white American. A man who grew up with little money and got scholarships to the good schools. A man who used his education to get him to the highest position in America.

Now when my son comes home from school complaining about his homework or crying because a white kid told him he was a "good-for-nothing n*****" I can tell him brush it off because he can do absolutely anything with his life when he is serious about his education. He now has an example of a person with mixed heritage that echoes his own, who has made it. Obama beat all odds to become elected to the presidency of the USA, and Handsome could do the same if he really wanted to. (Now, I DON'T want him to because I would be worried every day for the rest of my life, but if he really wanted to, he could.)

Now that the celebrations are over, poor President Obama will have the hardest job any president has had in recent memory. He walks into a mine field of problems with the economy, terrorism, and war, and yes, even racism. I can only pray that God will guide him to make the right decisions.

We did not go to the capital to watch the inauguration. It was hard to stay home because we are so close. On a normal day it would take us maybe 45 min to get there, but of course yesterday was no ordinary day. It would have taken f-o-r-e-v-e-r. The time it would have taken to get there plus the fact that Handsome is 20 months old, the temp was 25F, the windchill was 11F, and I was terrified of some attack all kept us home for the day. We watched everything from the comfort of our living room. Handsome knew that we were paying attention to something other than him so he was loud and climbing all over me so that he would get some of the attention. I kept telling him to watch, but of course he would have none of that. And would he crawl all over DH? Of course not. It was only Mom that he wanted. The only time he was quiet was at the end of the speeches when the crowd would clap. He would then look at the TV and clap and laugh right along with them as if he had been listening the whole time - or maybe it was because he thought it was finally over, who knows.

Oh, and one thing that I did not like? I didn't hear it when we were watching, but I heard it in the commentary afterwards. They said that the crowd boo'ed Bush when he was introduced. That makes me angry. Yes, be happy that a new president is coming, but do not disrespect the president that we have had for eight years. You can dislike his policies and even dislike the person if you like, but do not disrespect him. He was leaving office mere moments after his name was announced, why would you feel the need to treat him like that? There would be no good come out of that.

Dear Lord, please help our new president.