This is going to be convoluted and probably gramatically incorrect, I'm sure. But it's something I've been thinking about in the week since the DNC and something that I've been meaning to write since then.

Let's see...where to begin. Way back in January 2007, a woman by the name of Hillary Clinton --- some people may have heard of her --- announced her candidacy for the office of President Of The United States. I will never forgot that day as long as I live. I was home for winter break during my first year of college at Bryn Mawr College. I walked into the kitchen in the morning and my stepfather said something like  "Did you hear?" and I immediately said "She didn't!" and he grinned and said, "She did." And I spent the entire ride to and from Yale University, where I went with my mother and stepfather to a basketball game and is Senator Clinton's alma mater, thinking about how wonderful it would be to work on her campaign and to see a woman president. Ironically, what I felt was hope.

Months and months went by and I followed the campaign closely. Winter gave way to spring which gave way to fall. I never anticipated Barack Obama being any kind of threat to who was immediately deemed in my house as "my girl". He was young and he could wait. It wasn't his time. But the primaries kept getting closer and closer and more of them started to matter. And let's face it, I freaked out. I put on a smile in front of all of my friends --- most of whom were staunch Obama supporters, though I do have a close circle of Hillary supporters to commiserate with --- but I was always worried. I was angry and frustrated and wanted desperately to just scream "For god sake you are forty-six years old, can't she have her turn first! You like her!" And it was more than that. I believed in her so much. She wasn't putting on a show and she wasn't trying to fool anyone --- something I believed Barack Obama was guilty of doing in the primaries. I didn't want a phrase, I wanted a plan. Real live action, not just rhetoric and buzzwords. In addition to my problems with his campaign, I was wrestling with policy differences between him and Senator Clinton. I was bothered that he was not proposing universal health care. As an atheist, I was bothered that his faith influences his policies --- specifically his beliefs in regards to abortion rights. Finally, anyone who knows me knows that homophobia and descrimination based on sexual orientation is probably the thing that gets me most angry out of any other issue. I was well aware that Senator Clinton was on the whole the LGBT backed candidate in this election and wanted to do everything humanly possible to bring about serious equality in this country for all people.

Anywho, I wasn't a Barack fan. No way, no how. Fall turned into winter and when I returned to campus in January of 2008, I knew I had to help "my girl". So I did. I did everything. I made phone calls. I knocked on doors. I passed out lawn signs. I typed lists and stayed up late sending emails and organizing campaign events. I drove from here to infinity to field offices and events and neighborhoods. I introduced Madeleine Freakin' Albright. Okay, so that part wasn't that difficult. I pasted her name on the back of my car and all over my dorm room. And on one brisk day in April, I saw everything I had done pay off. I was at the campaign office in Ardmore before the sun was up, shoveling coffee and throwing air punches about winning the Pennsylvania primary with a million point advantage. I trudged off to middle of nowhere PA to hold signs at a random polling station. About two hours later, after I had already missed my billionth Modern Art class, someone whispered that she was coming there to greet people. My girl. Was coming. To greet people. One of those people. Was me.

Needless to say, it was pretty much one of the coolest moments of my life. Apart from the Madeleine thing and the birth of my niece. Even cooler was the fact that you know what? She won. With her ten point margin. And all I could think about as I sat in the Denbigh common room watching the election results --- why I was in Denbigh I don't remember --- with Kali, was that I had been a part of this. Not that I had done it all on my own and it was my vote that made the difference, but that I had helped. I influenced history. Crazy, right? Those few weeks were absolutely life defining. Only then did I believe my gut enough to say that this is it. This is what I want to do with the rest of my life. Grad school. Washington. Capitol Hill. Campaigns. Saving the world.

But all good experiences must come to an end eventually, or at least so they say. I think there was a part of me who knew all along that this was the it was going to end up. This was the way it was meant to be. So my girl steps down. Barack Obama in a complete takeover of what anyone I think anticipated happening back in January 2007 is named the Democratic nominee for President Of The United States.

Now what? At the beginning, I was angry and downright pissed off and indignant. I thought she deserved the nomination more and would be better than he would be as President. Then, I moved on to being just sort of sad and disenchanted. I was really bummed that this was my first presidential election and I couldn't see someone I admired and respected take that oath of office in January. But then something strange happened. I fell in love with Barack Obama. Before I go into why and how, I just want to say that I kind of feel like a widower falling in love again. I still believe Hillary Clinton would be the best choice for President. But, you know, that's not an option. I don't take back all of the comments I made against Barack Obama earlier in the year and before that, but I have learned to come around since there isn't another option. Sure as hell can't vote for McCain.

So back to falling in love with Barack Obama. While I was watching of all things, one of those cheesy introduction videos that played before his massive acceptance speech at the DNC, I think I finally got it. I got what he was getting at. I got to see it as not fake, but as real. What people who know him were saying about him was authentic --- his desire to serve on the lowest level, to solve problems that other people ignore, to use his priviledged education to give back, to treat every human being with dignity and respect. Not only were these things that I would appriciate in a (potential) president , but they were also things that I aspired to, that I wante to do in my life. For the first time, I got to see him as a role model. Then, throughout his speech, I saw something else I hadn't seen before that sealed it for me: compromise and hesistation. He addressed the things that were irking me --- abortion rights, gay rights in a way that was new. He wasn't totally confidant. But he knew that in order to draw support from people like me, he had to at least try. And while he might not have all the right answers (or all of the answers that Hilary Clinton proposed), trying is enough for me for right now. It's the least he can do in a world that is crumbling around all of us. Also, I got that together not divided thing as he attempted to compromise on these issues. He desperately wanted to focus on what makes us all the same, rather than what makes us differnet. And that's nothing if not my life's motto. So I'm ready to get behind that message and behind him. I don't need or want twelve million people to respond to this and say "I told you so." or "Finally." This transition was a huge deal for me and was the culmination of two years spent learning more about politics than my political science major ever could. From here, I'll do everything I can to elect Barack Obama to the White House. I saw my efforts pay off for my girl and I don't doubt they can work again on November 4th, 2008.

"Few will have the greatness to bend history itself, but each of us can work to change a small portion of events and in the total of all those acts will be written the history of this generation." - Bobby Kennedy 

Barack Obama 2008.