There seems to be a constructive debate roiling through numerous diaries, lately.
To be or not to be, hopeful?
My son was nearly beside himself when he received Michelle Obama's email calling for volunteers for a National Day of Service on MLK Day. Knowing he had the day off, he wanted permission to click through to find out where "The Obamas need us this time, Mom."
Michelle's Message
I had to smile at his young and hopeful face, and as a parent, I found myself hoping that his hero will live up to his idealistic expectations.
Of course, we clicked through and registered for a service opportunity on the obama service site, and signed up to pack Powerpacks with nutritious food for children who face food insecurity on the weekends when they are not in school for the Free and Reduced Lunch program.
Seeing my son's hopefulness and reading various comments about hope on this site have caused me to reflect on hope, itself.
Some on this site are finding it difficult to be hopeful, while others seem almost euphorically so. Barack certainly has made it a central theme, and from the polls, while Americans are certainly not ready to sing, "Happy Days Are Here, Again," it looks like the majority are at least willing to hum, "Hopefulness is here again."
At the moment, my son is bouncing around the kitchen and making me another pot of coffee, because he wants me to be as "fired up and ready to go" as he is. He senses that my hope is different from his, and he wants me to share in his level of joyfulness. I'm touched that my 13 year-old son yearns for me to be as over-the-top happy as he is.
He's found and laid out our Obama t-shirts to be worn over our sweatshirts, today, as we create the Powerpacks outside -- downtown, on the public square. Intuitively, he understands the potential power of us becoming living billboards for the messages of Yes, We Can and Hope and Change on the shirts. I also see that he's laid out his favorite Obama t-shirt -- the one he was wearing when he got to shake Barack's hand after a primary rally.
Will Obama live up to my son's hero worship? Is he worthy of such enthusiasm? Have some of Barack's actions already shown that we may need to be vigilant and actively push him on some issues? Should I talk with my son about these concerns -- prepare him so to speak -- just in case his hero fails to consistently deliver?
Maybe it's the second pot of coffee talking, but looking at my son as he's watching a rerun of Obama's Lincoln Memorial speech, I'm choosing to suspend my reservations, for now. Instead, I am going to choose to let my hope be renewed and restored. It will be good to wear our Yes We Can shirts and be of service, together. For, even though my son's new hope and my renewed hope are indeed different, I can see that the fundamental, progressive values underlying our different experiences of hope are wholly and solidly the same. I have faith in those values. I know that they did not begin with Barack, and I know that they will survive him, even if Barack fails to deliver and I am disappointed and my son's heart gets broken.
Over the last eight years, we've heard a lot about family values. Well, our family had values too! Our family values have spanned generations and been carried forward and reinforced by our family's oral history. Our stories are about how members in each generation stepped up to "fight the good fight" against different bastards in power who sought to demean, deprive, or deny ours and others' human dignity and our collective rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
I was brought up on stories about how our family resisted British genocidal actions in Ireland and managed to survive and migrate to this country. And once here, stories like how my Great Grandmom impaled a Pinkerton goon's hand to the window sill with a meat fork when the creep tried to climb in their company house while my Great Grandpop was down in the mine. (Yeah, rape was a union busting tactic, then.) Or, the one about my Grandpop throwing a brick through Ford's showcase window during the first Ford strike -- and how he got beaten to a pulp by scabs for it -- but he didn't give up until they got the UAW. These are just a few examples, and they may seem depressingly grim, but you see, we're proud of how we fought back against being starved as landless peasants in Ireland and worked to death as cogs in Corporate American mines and factories.
My generation has continued the tradition of fighting the good fight in various ways throughout our adult lives creating new stories. My Husband faced down the Chicago Draft Board to eventually get Conscientious Objector Status, but was ready and willing to go to jail rather than Vietnam. Later in life, he was fired by Reagan during the PATCO strike, but it never occurred to him to save his job and pension by selling out the union. Or my sister who volunteered after college to run into Salinas lettuce fields with Chavez to give the Latino organizers some "cover" -- afterall, they couldn't shoot white, educated Anglo girls, at that point in time. A labor lawyer, a politician, artists, teachers (Go NEA!) -- we protest, write letters, pay our dues, register voters, do community work, donate and hit the streets to support progressive politicians. And, of course we vote.
The Bush years have been God awful, but as a family, we have a collective, familial memory of this not being a new fight. We have a historical sense of moving forward, with an ever expanding coalition of people, towards a better future. Three generations ago, our people were starving to death under British colonialism -- today, all the members of my generation are college educated and armed with new ways and means to help move the progressive vision forward. Forty years ago, King had a dream about a black child walking through a school house door. Tomorrow, Barack Hussein Obama will walk through the White House doors, as our President.
My hope is not new like my son's, and I know all too well that this is just the latest round in class warfare that has been being waged for generations. But I also understand that the divide and conquer tactic has just be dealt a serious blow, and I plan on doing anything I can to make it a mortal one. That's why I so dearly delight in the diverse crowds standing together, happily shouting, Yes, WE can.
Will Obama get it perfectly right and get all of us all of the way there? Probably not, but he's giving the bastards one royal case of heartburn, and I believe that Yes We Can work with him to make significant, generational progress, this time. So, I've GOT renewed HOPE, and I'm heading out the door with my son to participate in the National Day of Service ... just like I'm seeing Obama doing as he's painting.
So, instead of talking with my son about FISA, today, on our way downtown, I think I'll tell him the story about how his Grandfather came to be the only white member of the local NAACP chapter in 1968 and what happenend when ...
Here's the link for finding service opportunities in your area