"Is everything sad going to come untrue?"
"...Is everything sad going to come untrue? What's happened to the world?"
"A great shadow has departed," said Gandalf, and then he laughed, and the sound was like music, or like water in a parched land; and as he listened the thought came to Sam that he had not heard laughter, the pure sound of merriment, for days without count. It fell upon his ears like the echo of all the joys he had ever known. But he himself burst into tears. Then as a sweet rain will pass down a wind of spring and the sun will shine out the clearer, his tears ceased, and his laughter welled up, and laughing he sprang from bed... "How do I feel?" he cried." Well, I don't know how to say it. I feel, I feel" --he waved his arms in the air-- "I feel like spring after winter, and sun on the leaves; and like trumpets and harps and all the songs I have ever heard!"
- J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973), The Return of the King
So I have to keep reminding myself that tomorrow it's back to work for the country ... there's so much to repair and rebuild after the last eight years. But isn't it wonderful to just enjoy this moment !
And what a day this has been! Voting first thing this morning. (Imagining our beloved American hobbits voting blue today too!) Waiting for this evening when the numbers would start to come in. Watching the blue numbers pile up and get bigger and bigger. Switching away at 10 pm from the hot-and-cold-running pundits on almost every channel to watch Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, and the rest of the Daily Show correspondents do an entire election-special hour *live* (including Jon and Stephen each trying not to be cracked up by the other). Then hearing Obama's over-the-top electoral-vote count announced by Jon Stewart himself. (The only thing better would have been Jon, Stephen, all their correspondents, and Keith O and Rachel M from MSNBC *all* announcing it together.)
Then McCain's admirably gracious concession speech. And then the hundred-thousand or so people filling in and spilling out of Grant Park in Chicago. And finally Obama's wonderful speech. When the camera found individual faces in that huge crowd, the faces all had the most incredible expression of slightly stunned and dazzled joy. I knew how they felt, and I imagine that I looked like they looked.
One of many stirringly beautiful passages from his speech:
And to all those who have wondered if America's beacon still burns as bright - tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope.
Unquenchable hope, indeed.