I just met the man himself. On his way to the Terre Haute speech in which he absolutely eviscerated Clinton's and McCain's attempts to make political hay out of his comments last week, Obama made an SGA (Special Guest Appearance) at Indiana University this afternoon. The whole thing was pretty awesome actually. Follow me behing the jump for the details.
So it's Little 500 weekend here in B-town. Anyone who's seen the movie Breaking away knows what I'm referring to. The main race is a 500 lap bike relay race competed in by the different fraternaties, the various campus housing units, and even the local townspeople (the Cutters). Today was the women's race. Basically the same, but a little shorter, and its all women competing.
Little 500 weekend is the biggest party weekend at IU. Sports Illustrated recently called it the best intermural college sports event in America. The entire week and weekend was (unofficially) kicked off with a free "Dave Matthews Concert for Change" last Sunday.
On Wednesday, the local paper started speculating that Obama - expected to be traveling by bus through the area on Friday - would make an unscheduled campaign stop here in Bloomington. Today's Bloomington Herald Times and IU student paper both had front page stories that Obama might stop by. There was much talk around campus and town, but noone was sure.
At 4:00, I was in a departmental meeting and a colleague of mine - who was looking at the news on his laptop - turned his screen towards me and said, "Check it out! Obama's at the women's Little 500 race." This guy knows I'm big for the O-man, and I have to say that the picture on the story he was showing me, of Barack sitting with a bunch of IU students watching the race made my heart skip a beat or two. My first thought was that I hoped the babysitter who was nice enough to take my little 2 1/5 year old to the race would get close enough for them both to see him. It turns out they both met him. I later found out that he recieved a very warm reception from the race crowd and then, to the chagrin of his schedulers, said that it would be rude to just appear and leave, so he sat and watched the race for about 20 minutes (just cool).
After what seemed like forever, our meeting finally let out around 4:30. I immediately checked my voicemail and found that my wife had been trying to reach me for the last hour. A journalist for the local paper was doing some mobile live-blogging from the campaign tour bus, and had just announced that they were headed "downtown." Upon calling her back my wife (currently a Hillary backer) and I agreed to meet in front of my building in 5 minutes and zip downtown ASAP (she likes Barack; she just likes Hillary more at this point). On my way to the exit, I had the good fortune to run into another colleague of mine, who just happens to be the state representative (a democrat) for our area. So I tell him that Obama is around, and that he is about to make an appearance somewhere downtown. He was actually originally pretty surprised that no one had contacted him to tell him (ahhh state party politics). I asked him if he'd like to ride downtown with my wife and I, and 5 minutes later the three of us were cutting through side roads to get to the county building.
At this point, having asked my state rep friend to join us started paying serious dividends. He calls the county Obama organizer and asks if he knew where Barack was going to appear after the race. The guy tells my friend to go to a place called Nick's English Hut. Nick's is a classic old school college town bar. It's right on Kirkwood (the main party street), just across the street from campus. This is where students go on weekends, and where they go to go crazy in the street when IU wins anything of substance (it's been a while - I know). Nick's is most famous for encouraging partons to play Sink the Biz. It's a drinking game where you float a glass in a beer bath and each person tries to fill the floating glass just to the point of it sinking. If you make the glass sink, you drink the glass. Brilliant, I know. The bar has bucket and glass sets that they'll set up for you to play. On a Friday or Saturday night, you can usually find up to 30 tables of people playing Sink the Biz.
So my frined tells us to cut up 6th in order to park close to the bar. We find a spot about three blocks away and heal-toe it to the bar.
It was a really strange vibe once we got there. This was an unscheduled visit, but folks seemed to know that he'd be showing up somewhere around there soon. So there was a bit of buzz and there were a number of young, overdressed 20-somethings standing around as part of the advance team. Still, I'd say the majority of people around there were just partying in celebration of Little 500. As my my wife, my friend, and I approach, I realize that the mayor and our US Congressman are standing in front of the bar. The next thing I know, my friend grabs my wife and I and pulls us over to meet Mayor Kruzan and Congressman Baron Hill. I've met both several times, but I was shocked when Representative Hill asked me how I was doing and whether I was satisfied with his vote on the SCHIP bill. I've talked to him maybe four times for a total of two minutes, but he remembered me and the specific issue we discussed last time I saw him. I was impressed.
So we're standing around waiting to see a black bus pull up or down the street. We waited about 15 minutes. Suddenly, the county organizer grabs my friend and tells him it'd be a good idea to get inside right now. So, Congressman Baron Hill, Mayor Mark Kruzan, our local State Representative and my wife and I head for the door. The thing I found most amuzing about this was that we were following these three puboic servants who were all dressed in suits, while my wife was in jeans and a T-shirt and I was in a shortsleaved shirt, jeans and flip-flops. I was sure that when we got to the door, the three reps would get in and they'd bar my wife and I from going in as obvious security threats. There was already a good deal of extra security on scene. So we get to the door, the Mayor goes in, Cogressman Hill goes in, my state rep friend goes in, and my wife and I very tentatively grab to door to enter. The whole time were walking in, we expect to be grabbed or told to go away. It was not to be however. We went right in, ordered two beers and a Coke (for our state rep of course), and began our wait for Barack.
Right after we went in they closed the door. No one else was allowed to come it after us. Everyone in that bar started to buzz. People kept standing up to look towards the window to see if he was coming. Suddenly this mass of humanity, surounded by police and secret service people moves towards the outside of the door. About 15-20 people came in in front of him. People were all lined up in the narrow eating area in the front of the bar. The secret service guys came through and kind of shoved us all towards the boothes on the sides to make a clear path down the aisle.
Then, it was showtime. Barack enters the bar. The place erupts with applause. The applause literally did not stop until he had walked through the room. It lasted the entire 10 minutes it took him to walk to the back of the room and up the stairs to the Sink the Biz room. The guy simply exudes charisma. I felt this unbeleivable intensity over seeing the people in the room react to him. He was tall, and moved with a confident grace that I've really never experienced. I was floored. He walked slowly through the room. Slow enough to not seem to be rushing; fast enough to never be standing still. Though he never seemed to stop, I litterally don't think he missed shaking hands with and making eye contact with every person in that room. It was amazing. He walked up to me. I put my hand out and shook his hand. I know it might sound silly, but I could feel all this emotion welling up in me just before he grabbed me. I'm not usually one to be star struck, but this was just so much. He looked me in the I and I looked back at him. And of course that was the point at which my mind overheated. I just clammed up. I wanted to thank him for inspiring me. I wanted to ask him how he was doing. I wanted to take his picture. I at least wanted to say good luck. All I could get out however, was an unintelligible grunt and the biggest smile I have possibly ever shown in public. And he looked at me, saw me like this, just gave me a confident understanding look, and moved on.
My wife was right next to me. Barack started shaking the hands of all of these folks on the other side of the narrow room. I felt like he was going to get past my wife - with her cute little outstretched arm - without shaking her hand. Suddenly, he turned around 180 degrees, looks right in her eyes and smiles. She - being less of a dweeb than me - said welcome to Bloomington. He put his hand on her shoulder and said said, "Thanks. It seems like a really nice place." Then he continued on. Went up the stairs, worked the entire upstairs area, which was filled with totally unsuspecting half drunk college seniors and grad students, and - unbeknownst to me - went out the alternative exit/entrance back onto Kirkwood Avenue.
I ran upstairs to see if I could see him agin. He was gone. As I walked through the upstairs rooms, the people were just going nuts. Everyone was on their cell phones calling friends about what had just happened. I kept hearing people say how amazing it was that he did that and that they just met him. I made it to the other door and poked my head out to see what was going on outside. At this point, all of the police and secret service and media activity in front of the bar had alerted people that something was going on. I don't know where everyone came from, but there must have been 3000 people in the street when he went back out there. The crowd was chanting "Yes We Can" and "O-bam-a!" It was like a rock concert. From where I stood, it looked the Kirkwood did the last time IU went to the final four.
Bottom line: amazing experience! Sorry if this went on a bit long. This was just something I felt like I really wanted to have a diary of. Hopefully I can update with some pics later.
UPDATE: When we got home, my babysitter asked my daughter to tell me who they had seen at the race. She played coy a while and then said, "I saw the guy. I say the presdint." Needless to say, I was a blubbery mess.