CATCH A FIRE

No, it has not taken me so long to write due to the PA results. Despite all indications (and my initial desire) I have not been hiding under the bed in a fetal position. I am only slightly embarrassed by my blind faith in his ability to win the state. My realization that he would not win Pennsylvania came in stages: STAGE 1: I am at my sister's house to celebrate my nephews birth. (He's 7). We both keep returning to her computer and pressing "refresh" on the CNN page. Nothing, nothing, nothing. My brother-in-law soon calls, "They called it! Clinton takes Pennsylvania!" " She what? What percentage of the vote is reporting?" "Eight-percent!" Now I am at the computer staring hopelessly at the check mark next to Clinton's name. "Eight-percent?!" What the?! Are you kidding me?!" My voice has raised in level significantly "How can they call it at 8%?!" What are you thinking?!" I yell at the helpless computer screen. "Lizzy", my sister says calmly..."they can't hear you." STAGE 2: It is after dance now, we just had a session of dancing blind-folded for 20 minutes. It was thrilling and liberating at the same time it was disorienting and confining. I am assured that my assertions around the lack of voyeurism in African Dance have now been taken to their highest level. I am magnetized to the drums. Then a vision comes: Obama is rising, Clinton leans off to the side, her face smiling, her arms open and generous, he beams. STAGE 3: We leave the building. My friend Becky gets in her car while I chat with a fellow dancer in the twilight. "Clinton is giving her victoy speech" she says as she backs out of her spot. I put my fingers in my years, mimmicking the behavior of the 5-year-old boys we both have. "I can't hear you, la la la" I say. We laugh, cause it feels better than crying. STAGE 4. I am home now, getting boys to bath and bed. NPR is blaring. Obama's speech is coming. Now. I stand in the kitchen waiting. Holding my breath. What will he say? The crowd is roaring. He is there. He begins to speak. I am doing dishes, putsing around. Next thing I know I am on my knees in the living-room. My jaw has dropped. He is not attacking Clinton, he is not (just) laying the groundwork for the next states. He is not talking about himself. He is talking about the country. He is naming the terminal state of our current context. He is talking, again about urgency. He is pointing to this moment. And the finger does not then move to himself. I imagine his hands opening to all of us. He is telling the people to act, he is asking them to make a difference. He is calling to the grass-roots. This political moment is seized, not for victory, but for a call to action, a call to rise beyond petty games, to take a serious look, to find a pathway forward. The children are dripping wet. Pajamas go on right next to the speakers. Listen, I whisper. It's Obama. This is important. Canyon stops fussing. "OBAMA" he chants. And the boys tune-in they hear these words of empowerment. We did not lose, we can't lose in a context where the politics have become about a movement and not just one man. I no longer feel defeated. Why should I? He certainly doesn't sound defeated, he sounds diligent, he sounds determined. Hope needs challenge, challenge requires endurance. Suddenly my hope is magnified, like the sunlight through a looking glass it has sparked, ignited, I see it catch, FIRE.