Warm Whispers

I had no idea I would be so affected by the election of Barack Obama. I watched most of the coverage with some friends who live down the road from me. As the call got closer and closer I felt a strong urge to return to my apartment and watch the remaining coverage on my own. I poured myself some cranberry juice and settled into my couch to wait for the call. Because of the time difference between the States and Korea most of us got up early because we did not want to miss any of the election coverage over here. Had I known we wouldn't get the call until 1:30 pm Korean time I might have caught a few extra hours of sleep.

I woke up this morning with a knot in my stomach and hope in my heart. I went for a long jog and convinced myself that I had to push a little longer today for good luck. It's pretty cold out today but I jogged about two more miles than I usually do to show my inner support for President Elect Barack Obama.

Anyways, I was sitting on my couch, sipping my cranberry juice, ignorning phone calls from the friends I had just left. When CNN finally called the election I hit the mute button on my television and watched the silent screen. They went to several different camera shots of peoples reactions from all around the world. I watched in silence for about two minutes until my eyes started to burn. I had felt empty up to this point. The sensation in my eyes began to fill me up until it spilled over and I was sitting alone in my apartment with salty tears running down my face.

I was shocked by my own reaction but understood my body was operating seperately from my mind at this point. I held my head in my hands and just waited until I was done. It took a while, and during this time I found myself thinking about the past, more specifically, my past. At a young age, in a school whose mascot was Jesus, I was told repeatedly all the things that I could not do and all of the things that I would never be. I was taught by negative associations because of what I looked like. These negative comments have remained with me to some degree ever since. Ghosts from my past whispering in my ear telling me I'm not quite good enough.

I thought, that if I had ghost then my parents must have demons, and if my parents had demons then their parents must have had devils. Oddly, this gave me a feeling of relief because life moves forward and I should not have to deal with the problems my parents had to deal with growing up. Life should improve from generation to generation.

Today, I truly believe that the seeds of hope, peace and real change have been sown and are being watered by tears of joy and pride.

It is my hope that through communication, hard work, acceptance and love the only thing whispering into the ears of my children will be warm summer breezes.

The world that we decide to live in is up to all of us.