That being said, it is going to be SO wonderful to have an intelligent president who listens, who cares and who acts with such dignity and integrity! We had a friend just visiting from France and she said that everybody in France had been watching the election with great interest and were very impressed that the U.S. had voted for a man who was obviously needed for our country right now.

My African American friends were either speechless, or crying. They all said that they never thought they’d see the day that a biracial person would be elected president. Thank God we, as a nation, were able to look past skin color to see what lies beneath.

And, since I’m originally from Chicago, I cried before and during Obama’s speech when I saw Grant Park filled with people of all colors and ages. Go Chicago!!!!!

Even though we have major problems in this country at this time, this is still a great country and I feel that it’s even greater now that we have Obama as president.

My husband and I were very active at one of the Obama campaign office in South Jeffco (Colorado). I actually took a picture of the NY Times website when the only county the called at 7:15pm was Jeffco! We were cheering and crying at the same time.

I was the Comfort Captain for the office and my husband was a Canvassing Captain. I arrived at 6am with juice, bagels and coffee.

And we were off! What an amazing day it was.

I had the most fabulous volunteers make lunches for 36 poll workers, snacks and lunches for the staff and canvass workers. We had three little girls show up with homemade brownies and a thank you note for working so hard.

We watched President Elect Obama’s acceptance speech with my 16 year old daughter, who’d also put in a lot time canvassing and putting together canvass packets, and cried.

Why did we worry so?

My voting day started at 7:15 when I left my house with my two first-time-voter children one eighteen and one twenty. When I went to vote in the primaries there were twice as many poll workers than voters – Michigan’s primary wasn’t expected to count – this time there was a line out the door and around the church fifteen minutes after the polls opened.

After the work day during which the most asked question all day was “did you vote yet?” (Not, please note, “did you vote?”) I went home to the beginning of our voting party. With so many people in our lives voting for the first time I wanted to make sure it mattered to these kids, these young people, these future leaders of America. We had many, many people at the house from 18 – 23 (and then me, of course ) over the course of the night. Lots of very wonderful passionate discussions about who should win and why. The invitation was clear – we don’t care who you vote for – just vote! and there were lots of young republicans and moderates along with those of us who are passionately liberal.

Then there was lots of wonder, and awe and silent breathing and holding hands as we realized what was happening.

Yesterday my youngest, only sixteen, turned to me and said, “Mom, it is so COOL to be living in the middle of history!”

We just couldn’t believe it was called so early–just a few minutes after 8 PM. When the DJ made the announcement, we were speechless. We honestly didn’t think we’d win this time, fearful the election was going to be stolen from us again. I think I just said, “No. Is this for real?” and burst into tears. My husband cranked up the dial, muttering, “What? What!” It wasn’t until the DJ played a clip of Wolf Blitzer announcing, “Barack Obama is the president-elect” that it started sinking in. Then we saw the restaurant decorated in bunting and red, white & blue balloons and we heard the crowd cheering from the second story balcony and we broke into big dopey grins–and more tears for me. It was really real!

We found a space and, on our way through the parking garage, people spotted my Obama/Biden T shirt and honked and cheered and we cheered back. The restaurant was packed and happy people filled the second story courtyard. It was too crowded for everyone to get in, but they’d set up 2 huge screens and we watched Obama’s speech outside, under the stars. I don’t normally like crowds, but was a wonderful thing to watch Barack’s perfect speech with a crowd of people of all ages and races–we wouldn’t have gotten that at home in front of the TV.

It was a particularly beautiful experience for me to meet older African Americans, who had been through so much in their lives, and to share their joy. We cheered and screamed “Yes we can!” and “Yes we did!” in unison looking to each other, shiny-eyed and smiling, as he spoke. It was the best feeling to be in that crowd.

It didn’t even matter that we couldn’t get into the party, I’m so glad we went. I’ll never forget November 4, 2008.

Yes we DID!

Kim

I’ve never had to wait in line more than ten minutes, and this year I was in and out in five (not including the time spent circling the bake sale), despite all the warnings that lines could be longer than usual. While I was voting, a teacher brought a small group of students in and explained to them what all the people were doing in their school that day…showing them the ballots and voting booths, and how and why people were filling them out.

In the afternoon I talked with a friend in Sweden, anxious as all our foreign friends were to see if Obama would win (almost 90% of Swedes were for Obama). She planned to stay up as late as she could and watch the reports on CNN. I heard from her again early Wednesday morning when she got up and saw the results, and all of Sweden seemed to be celebrating.

By Tuesday evening I had a migrain, but no matter how much my head hurt, I couldn’t go to bed until the results were in. I flipped on ABC a couple minutes before 10pm. First they said that as polls were open a couple more minutes on the west coast, they weren’t ready to call it. I watched the clock tick down that final minute with Cahrlie Gibson, held my breath as he said the polls in the west and Hawaii were now closed – and became choked with emotion when he said they were calling it: Barack Obama was the president elect. I quickly flipped through the other networks to confirm…CBS, NBC, CNN. Even though all were calling it for Obama, I was still a bit surprised – what with the way the last two elections panned out – when they said McCain was conceding less than half an hour later.

Though my head was throbbing even more, I was then too keyed up with emotion to go to bed. I listened to McCain’s excellent speech and wish his supporters there in AZ had been as gracious as he was. And then, of course, I had to stay up just a little bit longer to see Obama speak from Grant Park, wishing I could be with that crowd a mere three hours south of me on such an historic night.