January 21, 2009

A new day

My computer's been acting up, so I haven't been able to download photos from my camera or think about blogging, but I had to use some of my little available working-screen-time to write about yesterday.

Even if you didn't vote for Barack Obama, you had to be moved by not only the historic nature of his election, but also the emotion in Washington yesterday. It was visible on TV, and I'm sure must have been palpable to anyone in a 10-mile radius (the one time I was sorry I didn't still live in northern VA). Wow.

I think I was moved most by two things: one, the peaceful transition of power and how effortless it seemed -- we are the ONLY country in the world who can say that. And I also felt that there was more in these inaugural ceremonies that included me, a non-Christian Unitarian Universalist, than there has ever been before. From Eugene Robinson's "God of our many understandings", to President Obama's inclusion of "non-believers" in his list of religions, to Rev. Lowry's inclusion of hymns that cross Christian and UU lines, I felt like I didn't have to edit in my head. That's new for me, and a pretty amazing feeling. I have a very small sense of what it must have been like for every non-white citizen in this country, watching a non-white man take the oath of office. Wow.

And to cap it off, our final warm-up at Mastersingers rehearsal last night was "My Country Tis of Thee", in probably 16-part harmony by 130 singers. Wow.

That's about all there is to say. Wow.

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