Please forgive me if I ramble and at times don’t make sense.
I didn’t want to write this article. But I came to the realization that I had to write this article. Otherwise, I would have regretted it the rest of my life.
On election night, when I saw Barack Obama had won the presidency, I literally fell to my knees and wept. When I saw all those black people in tears, I knew why they were crying. My heart was too heavy, and as much as I wanted to stop those damn tears, I couldn’t.
I thought about my 87-year-old mother who waited in line for hours to vote for a black man, or my father, with his steely brown eyes filled with tears. The pain was indescribable.
I wondered, why all the heavy tears? Heck, I voted for the other guy. My mind sent me back to my high school teacher, who told me I wasn’t smart enough to go to college — or that my IQ was so low that maybe I should set my sights on a vocational school.
I remember the time when I hated the color of my skin — because where I grew up, everything black was bad and everything good was white.
I remember secretly asking God: How come I couldn’t have been born white?
When Sen. Obama finished his acceptance speech, my heart was racing. I just wanted to tell those teachers, “See, I told you that you were wrong.” Never in my wildest dreams did I let myself believe that a black man could become president. Just too much pain to bear.
I finally composed myself as best I could, realizing the shirt I was wearing was soaked with my tears as well as the tears of all those unnamed black people who are no longer with us — who dare not dream that same dream.
Later that night, sitting alone in a chair, staring out the window at nothing in particular except those stars, I thought I had finished crying. But damn it, I hadn’t. I asked myself about what happened. Why such an emotional response? I will assume some of it had to do with the historic moment. But there was something deeper. Something that had touched my soul in a way that even I thought was not possible.
As my eyes began to tear up, I got angry with God and begged him: Please, no more tears.
I then understood what those tears were about. It was about some of those black kids killing one another over drugs or the colors they were wearing. It was about those young black kids who had no fathers to tell them dreams can come true. It was about those teachers who look at minority children and silently believe they aren’t smart enough.
President-elect Obama is not God. He can’t make you love your child any more than you already do. He can’t change the hearts of those teachers who still believe in the soft bigotry of low expectations. He can’t make parents read to their children, or have a parent call a teacher to see how things are going.
President-elect Obama is just a man. What he can do is talk about the majesty of this country. Only in America, with this tragic legacy of slavery, can a descendant of slaves become president.
I want to say to the young people of this country, especially kids who look like him or me, that you must study. You must dream that dreams are God’s way of saying this is what I want you to do.
In this country, dreams can and do come true. But only if you’re willing to pay the price. You may not become president or even a famous athlete. But for those who can fulfill their own dreams, it is a magical moment filled with grace.
That is why it matters so much what happens in your house, and not what happens in the White House.
No excuses.
Federal Way resident Walter Backstrom: wkbackstrom@aim.com
