Getting there

We traveled to D.C. from Toledo on Friday. The security woman at the Toledo airport was kind and excited about the inauguration. She was planning to take the day off and watch it from home.

Charlene Gilbert and her daughter, Simone, 5

On the plane from Detroit to D.C., there were lots of kids traveling with adult teachers, parents, friends, etc. It was nice to see. I sat in the aisle across from a man and his two sons. As I sat on the other side of the aisle with my two girls, I thought for a brief moment how all of this will impact our children. I loved seeing the joy on the faces of his sons. I felt a great deal of hope for all of our children. Then Simone’s ears began popping and I cradled her crying body until we landed.

Preparing

We are making plans for the next few days, but I actually am not that interested in “events.” I want to do more talking to my oldest daughter about why this is such an important day. She overheard some critics of Obama who inadvertently robbed her of a little of her joy about this weekend (which came as a complete surprise to me when I arrived here). We talked about differences, justice, war and peace last night. Big topics for a little girl. But part of me is beginning to feel like I may have sheltered her too much by talking about tough issues in broad, kid-friendly, general terms. Perhaps I need to tell her all that unspoken stuff that has been floating just under the “inaugural” national chatter.

I keep thinking she is too young for that talk. But if I don’t tell her, will she think this weekend is just about a big party, souvenirs and long lines? Will it make any difference in how she experiences the day? She is only 9.

Opening ceremony

Ashara, 9, and Simone, 5

The opening ceremony was wonderful. HBO color-corrected the day but, the day didn’t need to be enhanced; it was perfect as it was. The sky was gray, the reflecting pond was covered in patches of ice, the people surrounding us were all joyful. My daughters were perched on a rail overlooking the water. They could see the Lincoln Memorial and they could see the huge TV screens; the only thing they couldn’t see or possibly know was the journey we had traveled as a nation to arrive at this moment.

I searched for words, but it was so hard to find the right words, the appropriate words for children, the specific words that would have explained the tears streaming from faces or the still calm that flowed through the crowd when the first official voice came over the microphone.

So at some point I gave up the search for words. I just stood there and as I stood still, I realized how very, very quiet it was. Some 500,000 people were standing in near silence, waiting to begin. I looked around and concentrated on what this moment really meant. People of all ages, races and ethnicities were standing together, in joy, awe and humility. I looked at my daughters and all I could do was hug them and kiss their faces and try to squeeze the memory into their spirit. Then I looked up into the faces of a few of the older people in the crowd and I could feel this sense that we were there not so much to witness history but to bear witness — for all those we carried with us to this day — for all those who not only didn’t live to see it, but could not have imagined that we would see this day. I traveled to Washington, D.C., to stand in a crowd, two days later, some two million people and witness the swearing-in of our 44th president. I traveled to D.C. to bear witness.

Inauguration day

Gilbert

The actual day of the inauguration was colder than the day before, more people than I had ever seen in one place, and more daunting to navigate than I had expected, even with diminished expectations. Our family friends, with whom we were sharing the entire inaugural experience, subtly suggested that perhaps my youngest daughter would not last the day out in the elements and doing the long walk. Traveling en masse is a challenge, traveling en masse with children is a bigger challenge, traveling en masse with one 5-year-old in a crowd of millions is, well, let’s just say nearly impossible. Nonetheless, I politely declined to leave Simone behind, but did accept the extra key (code for “If you fall behind, at least you can get back”).

In preparation for this day, I had read all the children in the house the Obama kid biography, asked lots of questions to make sure they were getting the big facts, and provided editorial comments in the places where the story had been smoothed over (i.e. I had to explain divorce, the Rosa Parks story and why Obama was called “Barry” as a child).

I explained a lot of history to Ashara, my 9-year-old, and how this day was only possible because people of all colors, religions, ages, nationalities and backgrounds had come together and believed in a powerful dream. At some point, the civil rights movement came up and she told me I wasn’t born when that had happened and I told her that I was born during that decade and two years after I was born, a black man was shot for simply going into a bathroom marked “whites only.” I had to explain it twice before she got it, but she got it.

And then, at some point, I realized, beginning with this day, we get to do more showing and less telling. I realized I had been worried too much about words. As we walked into the river of people flowing toward the Capitol, I realized we were surrounded by images of Obama and the Obama family. I realized that I didn’t need words for this day. All I needed to do was to tell my daughters to look. Look at Obama. Look at Michelle. Look at Sasha and Malia. Look at all these people standing in the cold, listening with every ounce of their being to President Barack Hussein Obama. Look at what is possible when good people come together. See what Martin saw. Now, make new dreams, work for justice, do good in this world, be thankful.

The Journey Home

We spent the day traveling from D.C. back to Toledo via Detroit.

We drew a lot of attention. Simone was wearing the hat she got on inauguration day, not an Obama hat per se, but instead a wide-brimmed, red hat with red, white and blue feathers. I am not really sure it was actually for sale. It was just the hat she wanted from the vendor and I think in his mind, for $10 she could have anything on the cart she wanted, including a random red hat. The hat was just a small symbol of the absolute joy that infused our trip.
The morning we left D.C., we could not get a cab, the streets were jammed with cars, and the buses were packed. As we walked to the closest train station in the midst of a huge traffic jam, Simone got tired, said she couldn’t pull her suitcase anymore, and we couldn’t make it to the train. Without missing a beat, Ashara grabbed her sister’s suitcase, pulled it with her free hand, and shouted, “Yes, we can!”

Gilbert is the director of the Catharine S. Eberly Center for Women and professor in the departments of Women’s and Gender Studies and Theatre and Film.

This entry was posted   on  Tuesday, January 27th, 2009 at  5:26 am and is filed under  Op-Ed. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.   You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.