Wednesday, November 5, 2008

You're right Stan. There's nothing I can say about it. But there's sure something I'm gonna do about it.

That was great. It was emotional. More emotional than I thought it was gonna be. Yeah, sure. Nothing’s really changed in terms of policy, economy, the general right/centrist type view that our government has sort of always held, but dude…I repeat, dude, there’s a fucking BLACK PRESIDENT ELECT today!!!!
That is huge. That is so fucking huge that I couldn’t even see it. It’s like in a movie where a guy is just standing there against a plain grey wall, and you’re watching and thinking ‘man, what a dull little bit of mis en scene', and then all of a sudden the wall begins to move and you realize he’s standing in front of a blue whale who’s, I don’t know, on a truck, or maybe the guy’s underwater. Who cares. Listen, the point here is that this whole thing was so large I kind of didn’t see it until last night when they showed all those people in Grant Park in Chicago. Black people, people. Firstly, TV doesn’t generally show non famous black people having a good time. If you don’t believe me go ahead and watch that again to see how foreign it looked. Secondly, the joy and hopefulness that was sort of just exuding from all these faces was amazing.
It was in my town and I was stuck at home with a kid. Missing history. I didn’t want to be down there in the park. I hate crowds like that. It’s terrifying to me, but I wanted to do something. Celebrate with a fellow random Chicagoan that our guy, our senator, our fellow resident of Chicago is the first black president. It wasn’t a political thing, it was an emotional and a local thing.
So, when my wife went to bed (we did some celebrating over here, so she went to bed with a garbage can, you know, just in case) I took off. I was thinking, ‘man, it’s a little irresponsible to leave a baby and a quasi-passed out woman home alone…I better take my skateboard and make this quick.’
So, I jumped on my skateboard and headed to my favorite local bar, but they were playing Toby Keith and there were just two depressed people in there. Seemed a little wrong. Not the vibe I was hoping for, you know? SO, I shot over to this german bar but it was the same, except the music was German. Again, not really screaming “Let’s celebrate the black guy’s victory.” In fact, you might even say that both bars kind of exuded the exact opposite sentiment. Huh? Hicks and Germans, everyone.
At this point it had been about four minutes since I left my house and I really didn’t want to be gone for long so I went to the creep bar that’s right by my house. I’d normally never set foot in this place. It’s full of…I don’t know, creeps. It’s just gross, and this is from a guy who likes gross bars. There’s just something kind of, ‘there’s an unconscious kid tied to the boiler’ about the ambience. Anyway, two greek looking dudes were in there, but the door was locked and they told me they were closed. I don’t know what they were up to, and I didn’t really care, so I shot over to the gay bar thinking ‘this is gonna be great. I should have gone here first.” When I show up, it’s pretty empty but Ralphie (a woman) was kind enough to join me in a shot of Cuervo (it was on special and I was in a big hurry at this point). We drank to Obama and then I came rushing home. Everything was cool, and I went to bed thinking, man, this is gonna be a funny story to tell my kid when he asks if I was celebrating during the crazy night when Barack Obama became the first black president and spoke to a hundred thousand person crowd in Chicago. Well, you and your mom were asleep so I got on my skateboard and did a shot of tequila with a sixty year old bull dyke at the ‘gay-bar-for-older-people’ in our neighborhood. Not quite the ‘yes we can’ moment of a lifetime, but it’s something pretty good. And I’ll take it.
This kid will not remember a world where there wasn’t a black president. That’s so cool. My friend Katie pointed out that chances are real good he won’t remember a world where there was one either. And that’s just a good joke, man. That’s how jokes are crafted people. You piss on dreams right out of the box. Like they were a bunch of urinal cakes. Nah, I don’t know. Today’s a great day. I feel awesome and it’s beautiful outside. Today is also maybe the only day of your lifetime when you can probably tell your boss you’re hung over, and regardless of what your affiliation or his is, he’ll (let’s be honest, bosses are men…heh) probably be okay with you doing a shot or having a beer. Because he’s either totally happy, or totally bummed. And that calls for a beer either way.
So get your beer. The expiration date on this kind of thing is quickly approaching and next week it’s gonna be the same bullshit we’ve always dealt with. Today though, fuck worrying for a sec. Fuck it. You gotta make time to dance too. This is your only life, and something big happened yesterday that didn’t involve buildings falling down and people dying, you know, unless you count Obama’s ties to Al Quaeda. Fuck, man. I got some living to do and I’m going to get a newspaper for my kid to have when he gets older.
Yeah, I know. It’s Washington business as usual. Tell me all about it next week naysayer. Also, how long before that Alaskan chick (what was her name again?) is getting offers from playboy? I’d love to see her nude with a shotgun holding that Trig guy. Actually, I’ve already got a shirt with that on it. Minus Trig. That’s kind of tasteless in retrospect. I mean fuck. Now that she’s just some hick mom with a pregnant daughter and a kid in Iraq and a retarded baby, I kind of feel bad for her. As opposed to hating her, which I did yesterday. Man. What a day.

15 comments:

Candice said...

great post! i never thought you could be so inspirational.

Civil Danarchy said...

I was trying to stream the whole thing on my computer, we don't have cable, and it was like 3 minutes behind live, so when Obama gave his speech I was sprawled out on my futon, alone, and had to call up my girlfriend in Mass, I'm in Maine, to have her hold up her phone to her TV so that I could hear him live, so I missed a big celebration too, but like you said... "I'll take it". Truly amazing man! We're all part of something new, and we need to step back and take it all in.
Peace, Love, Community!

amandatague said...

my method of celebration was to drink andre out of a glass cowboy boot. it was a good decision.

Crooks Blogojevich said...

BK, you weren't talking about the L&L for the first bar, were you? Toby Keith? That disheartens me a little, living literally around the corner. Nah, couldn't be.

Also, it was great to see, 10 minutes after Obama was announced the winner, a group of young black folks hoot'n'hollarin' at Belmont & Halsted, like they were on-stage for a fucking Cash Money concert--like they were all suddenly rich and checks were going to start coming in next week. Nothing says "we've come so far" as a bitch getting down on all 4's in the middle of the crosswalk, in front of stopped cars, shaking her shit like Juvenile was gonna make it rain on her...and I voted for Obama and was releived to see him win.

M! said...

Last night I was both glad to be where I live (San Francisco surrounded by Obama supporters) and pissed that I wasn't where I used to live (Chicago). Regardless, last night was huge and your entry made my day above and beyond our new opportunity. Who knew the US could get this one right?

Mikey said...

I can only imagine...

Up here in Canada we've been pretty fucking happy too (as much as we hate to admit you guys have such an influence on our lives...). Today in one of my classes we re-watched Obama's speech. Great stuff.

Again, I can only imagine what it would be like to actually be American on this day.

Alright...now maybe we can work on getting our shitty conservative PM kicked out the door.

stranger than fistin said...

I'm from/registered in a white collar suburban hellscape that was decidedly pro-McCain, but fortunately I was in Ann Arbor by the time the results started coming in. Such an unforgettable night (my state ALSO legalized medical marijuana and stem cell research!).

Another excellent blog, sir.

xNARCOPLETICx said...

Indeed a douchy moment on TV with Karl Rove. Sweet cookies dude...

Buddy said...

When we were talking about this election over shots at Subt after Powell's endorsement, I gotta say, you totally fucking called this shit!! and I agree, regardless of party affiliation, it would have been a great night to be in Chicago. Let me know when you wanna do that guest lecture prof. kelly!

Sickie27 said...

"You better bring lots of water with you to work today, there are going to be a lot of salty crackers!" is a text my brother received from a friend this morning.

And how TRUE. No one wants to admit they're racist, but all last night and today that's all I've been seeing. So much for learning from history down here in the South! Gotta love it.

Jason said...

lol at that Ann Arbor comment, man it couldnt have been that great, the whole south eastern part of the state had obama as the winner in the major counties. But yeah it was a good night, a worse morning though, the victory was short lived and today it was back to michigans and the united states shortcomings. Bring on the future, and once again karl rove and keith olbermann are my heroes, rofl!

the best was cnn though was anyone watching that shit! man they have a lot of money, holograms, 70 inch touch screens to flick videos off of. i cant help but think that money could have been better spent. will i am looking like he was out of a star wars movie was pretty cool though.

Anonymous said...

yeah, since when did we reach the star wars era with cnn's holograms, i half expected to see r2d2 in the back of the set projecting will.i.am to anderson cooper.

planespotting said...

In my 25 years on the earth, I've only saved papers once before this - I saved the Trib when the White Sox won the World Series in '05. I'm not really sure why - I'm not even a white sox fan. but it seemed pertinent at the time. Now, I've had it for three years (Oct. 27, 2005) and why should I throw it away now, ya know?

But today, I grabbed the NY Times from Starbucks with this fucking shit-awesome headline:

"OBAMA"

and it was good. This one deserves to be kept.

LaurenSmash said...

fuck yes. life is good.

Jason said...

Lol yea I know it was sweet, u wonder what they're gonna have next time 3d map of the united states. 2d is soo last century!

Oh man also to the white sox paper keep that. Its not that good though when the cubs win again buy one right away and put it in a glass case it'll be worth something since you know the last time they won was forever ago!! I'm still waiting for the tigers or lions to give me a paper worth framing.