My Thoughts on Inauguration Day

I sat in my classroom yesterday looking at an event that I never really dreamed as being possible as a little kid. I remember studying MLK Jr. as a kid and I remember listening to my grandfather lose his cool when African Americans were referred to in a derogatory term. I remember going to school in the fourth grade and learning that an African American family had moved to our small central Illinois town and how they only lived there for three weeks. I remember family friends referring to King in negative terms. I remember standing idly by as people told jokes about African Americans, maybe even laughing just to fit in. But as I watched yesterday and followed this election from start to finish I realized that what President Obama had been preaching his entire campaign, "CHANGE", had actually occurred in me. I think that over this past two years I have grown more tolerant of our differences and less tolerant of ignorance. I have grown more aware of other people's situations and maybe less aware of my own.

Being in Springfield the day that this journey kicked off will be something I will always remember. Meeting then Senator Obama and his wife Michelle on two different occasions will be something I always remember. Watching the first African American President of the United States being sworn in with all of those individuals who fought so hard for equality during the 1960s will be something I always remember. Listening to the ignorance of people and their remarks based on nothing other than ignorance will be something I hope to forget.

I can only hope that my own children remember it for what it really was. The day some of America grew up.