The day after, part 2.

I hear you Jamal, and I saw a lot of that same tired look on white folks faces. Damn. Electing a black man took a lot of work huh? I mean it took us forty years longer to do that than to put a man on the moon, so sheez, I bet they are tired. Lord knows, I am. But yeah, I noticed that the white people I passed by seemed kind of lost. I mean for the last twenty months white people had a reason to talk to me- I mean, they had a conversation starter. You know "I am so excited that we might actually elect an African American to the office of President." or "Isn't Barack Obama great? I bet you never thought you'd see someone with a name as unique as yours in the White House." This would precipitate a conversation about my name, or how their biracial nephew admires Obama, or how they admire Michelle, you know.

But now, they didn't know what to say. A few people tried to start up convos with. "Isn't it great?" But when I responded "Yeah, It's pretty great." the conversation just kind of trailed off. A few times, I tried to stir things up with "What? Isn't what great? Did something happen and I missed it?" Which seemed to provoke stares of confusion as they walked cautiously away from me. A couple of times they would find another white person and whisper to them as they pointed back at me. One would shrug their shoulders and the other would put their arm around them and whisk them off to a happier, less confusing place.

Tamika

The day after.

The first thing that I noticed in the post-Obama world was that white people were worn out. I mean they looked tired. Maybe it was from all the drinking and celebrating the night before, or from all the phone banking, but man, people looked wrecked the day after the election.

I, myself, got a hella good nights sleep, and woke up feeling refreshed and ready to tackle the world. Except I didn't have to! The world was tackled for me the night before. What a relief.

Anyway, I walked down the street on the way to work and white people were smiling at me from across the street. In fact, for the first time in my life white people actually crossed the street to walk on the *same* side of the street as me instead of crossing to the opposite side. It kind of scared me at first, but then they would give me a tired smile and point at their worn out "I voted" sticker that they had torn off the shirt that they wore the day before. It seemed like that was about all the energy they could muster. I smiled back. Once or twice I heard myself say "good job."

Jamal