Joyous elders, cranky kids, and a family rewarded by a detour to the port-a-potty: Everything that follows comes from Brooklyn-based writer and ringShout co-founder Martha Southgate:
The inauguaration of Barack Obama. With more than a million people in attendance, there are that many stories, of course. This is my version of ours.
I’ve gotta start out with a huge, huge thank you to my dear friend Jeannie Quinn and her father, Mr. James Quinn. Jeannie, for mentioning at Christmas dinner that her father lived on Capitol Hill and wouldn’t be there on the big day. And then, when she asked her dad if we could use the house, he and his wife agreed graciously and quickly, without hesitation and without charge. We can’t thank all of them enough for making our day possible.
Mon. Jan 19.
Picked up the Zipcar and got going around 9 am. The first auspicious sign was that from NYC to DC we didn’t hit a lick of traffic. After a couple of hours, when we were sailing through Baltimore, I started to think “there isn’t going to be a traffic jam?!” But I didn’t speak up for fear of jinxing it. But so it was. We sailed up to Mr. Quinn’s house, found a parking spot a few houses away and didn’t touch the car again until it was time to go home again the next day. Unbelievable. I can only surmise that most people had either already arrived or came in on the morn ing of the 20th. But we felt pretty darn lucky (and traffic on the way home was the same way–I’ve had a harder time trying to get through Jersey on a Saturday. It was downright eerie. But great).
We got settled in the house (which is beautiful) and then walked out to see what was going on. Everyone else had the same idea. But everyone was so jolly and good natured. There were Obama-stuff hawkers every few blocks and we did our share to contribute to the Obama-economy. We bought three American flags with his face on them (to wave on the big day), a fake Inauguration ticket on a lanyard, earrings for my sister a necklace, a couple of buttons and a T-shirt (my mom got stuff for my brothers and for some of her friends). Not in evidence was my favorite Obama tchotcke thus far, spotted on the streets of Brooklyn: an Obama light-switch plate. Nate said that all the stuff being sold would probably solve the economic crisis. I wish. We gawked at the Capitol and took pictures ?a highlight was taking a picture of Ruby with a guy in a donkey suit. As he left us, he put his front hooves together and bowed. A lowlight was having to stop and use one of the freezing porta-potties. This was Ruby’s first experience with the rock-and-roll aesthetic in such a situation and she wasn’t thrilled. “There’s no toil et paper.” she moaned. I told her that this would be far from the last time she had to deal with such a situation. She was horrified but rallied.
When we got back to the house, my mother (who will be 80 years old in March?imagine how she must feel about this! Obviously, I know her well and I still can’t fully absorb what it would be like to be born black in 1929 and then to arrive at this day) had arrived with her friend Kim Yanoshik (who proved to be my mother’s guardian angel for this trip-thanks Kim!). Lots of hugging and kissing ensued. My mother and I had had a notion of going to the Cave Canem poetry reading that night but once we were back in the house, the notion of getting onto the insanely crowded Metro was just too horrible. I was very sorry to miss the reading but just couldn’t drag myself back out. I should say here too that my mother, through the good offices of Joe Shafran and Ron Ratner (yes, of the Cleveland-based Atlantic Yards Ratners?what can I say? They’re not all bad) , prominent Cleveland citizens that my mother has met and worked with through her project Restore Cleveland Hope (www.restoreclevelandhope.org), had been given two tickets to the yellow section of the inaugural, one seated for her and one standing for her friend Kim (this was a pretty close section?very good seats!). This was one of the many miracles of the weekend. When the driver that Ratner had arranged for brought her the tickets (how’s that for service!) we invited him in and videotaped him and the tickets and just generally carried on. It was quite a moment. The tickets were yellow and embossed with the presidential seal.
So after all that, we settled in. I made dinner and we all talked and sat around until it was time for the Kids Inaugural ball on the Disney Channel (Here is where I suppose I should confess my secret affection for the Jonas Brothers?if you don’t know who they are, ask a 10-year-old girl). The concert was the sort of homogenized tween pop one would expect from such a show but I was totally charmed by Malia and Sasha during the concert. They were obviously thrilled (Malia knew all the words to the Jonas’s big hits and sang along) and they danced, as did their mother, in a thoroughly unselfconscious manner, bumping hips and making each other laugh. Malia took lots of pictures with her little purple camera. They appear to be such gr ounded, unaffected kids. I love watching them.
After that, it was bedtime. Needed to be rested up for the big day.
Tuesday Jan 20,
My mom and Kim left to go get their seats at 7:30. We made a tactical decision?since one Jumbotron is much like another, we decided not to leave super early so that we wouldn’t be sitting still in the cold for too long. We knew we’d have to walk a long distance on the mall anyway. So we set out around 9:45, layered up like we were going skiing. We walked. And walked and walked. It’s hard to describe what it’s like walking with thousands of people. We were all spread out and jovial?there were only a couple of times where I felt so squeezed that it was scary. But there were just so many people. And we were outside the mall all of this time, usually walking a street or two south. We started out i n good spirits but at around 11, started to get concerned that we wouldn’t be in position to even hear anything when the action started. We hadn’t fully appreciated what it was going to be like to move through and with a crowd of that many people?despite our desire not to be standing still and freezing for hours, we got worried that we should have left earlier. Near the Smithsonian, Jeff and I started to lose our resolve and thought perhaps we should stop at a place we were where we could hear a little bit. But Nate urged us onward. Ruby, by this time, was muttering dark imprecations about how she could have been watching the whole thing at school with her class and eating Chinese food (they are studying China and were having a special lunch). Things were tense.
But thank heaven, we did take Nate’s advice. We walked on until we were close to the Washington Monument and within earshot of a Jumbotron at 11:30.We heard the end of Rick Warren. We heard Joe Biden take the oath. Much screaming and flag waving. Then Aretha sang (I didn’t get to see her fabulous church-lady hat until I got home and watched our DVR recording of the coverage, but she sounded good) and then Obama. Well. Oddly, I have to say, I didn’t cry on election night or hearing him take the oath of office. My response b oth times was more along the lines of hysterical leaping about and screaming in ecstasy. Jeff said that he wished he had videotaped me. Everyone shouted and yelled, even though we weren’t in the dense crowd on the mall. It was a rare moment of pure public joy.
We listened to part of the speech and then Jeff said he had to use the bathroom and thank God he did, because that led us to an area that was completely open and uncrowded, which we were able to cross and get a pretty good view of a Jumbotron. So we watched the end of the speech on that. Shouting, yelling, leaping again. I have to admit, because of all the cold and the distractions of the many, many people, I didn’t really listen to the speech until I got home and watched the whole thing on TV. But the import of actually being there with the millions had a density and vibrancy that I felt just as blessed to be a part of. Both things were great.
Because of the cold, and worry about getting stuck when all those people left the mall, we cut out before Elizabeth Alexander’s poem was over (although, again, I listened to it at home?I wasn’t a poem for the ages but it was appropriate and skillful. And heaven knows it’s exciting to see a genuine African-American poet of some seriousness and ambition in this slot). Another thing that I didn’t hear until I got home that was almost as thrilling to me as Obama’s taking the oath was Reverend Lowery’s benediction, with its near complete quoting of “Lift Ev’ry Voice and Sing” and its joyous variation on the old saw “if you’re black get back, if you’re brown stick around?etc” The way he used the lyrics without even pointing out that they were the lyrics but simply letting them stand with their benedictory quality for everyone?making us a complete part of this American moment?sheesh. That choked me up.
When we got back to the house in DC, our friends Tom, Nancy and Lulu were there and we all had some champagne?they had the only sad story of the day that I had heard (although I understood later that there were many others). They were ticketed but in a section that never opened. So they and everyone else in their group (the purple group) didn’t get in at all. They took it very well though (better than I would have). They were glad to be a part of the day?which I thought showed a remarkable good-spiritedness.
So being there?yes, it’s a fragmentary, imperfect experience. And there’s no way to really plan ahead for moving through a million people on a cold January day. But it was a joyous, once-in-a-lifetime event one that I feel truly blessed to have been part of. My mom kept saying that the whole thing was a miracle. I think she might be right.
I wish President Obama and his family all the best (how fun is it to write that?!) And for all of us, may we take up his call to be better, more responsible, activist citizens and human beings in the days and years to come.
xo,
Martha
p.s. And can I just say—Jay-Z performing at one of the inaugural balls?! Another great American moment.
Comment(s)
I could have done w/out the celebs, even the artsy-intellectual ones at the Root Ball (even tho I got some nice dap due my Root piece w/Gates). I sensed they had taken it over. I thought Barack was the anti- flash bang?
Strange how we froze from 6am thru 10am 1/20, but as soon as the program began and I could see Sasha and Melia on the Jumbotron, I could feel my toes again, and my face warmed…