Clown and mother
During the campaign, Barack Obama reached out to Native People and was adopted in a traditional Crow ceremony by Hartford and Mary Black Eagle of Lodge Grass, Montana. They were introduced as grandparents to Malia and Sasha. Obama honored his Black Eagle family by having them brought to Washington DC and given prime seats to witness the Inauguration Ceremony.
His mother Dr. Stanley Ann Dunham Soetoro, would have been proud.
I suppose if my husband was running for president I would let professionals groom me. As it is I’m ready to go to the salon of the mom of a kid who goes to my school and let her have at it, even though her six-year-old looked like she cut her own bangs. (Her mom cuts hair for a job, what are the chances?…)
Watching the speech I kept trying to memorize phrases for later reference, but in the end, my favorite part came after the speech when Malia and Sasha came on stage and waved to the video feed of Obama and said “Hi Daddy!” into the microphone. Tall stately Michelle Obama bent down to talk to her daughters. (Physical Theatre–stronger than words)
At the YMCA swimming pool we were getting ready to leave and I said to the other mother, “I think we’re missing Michelle Obama’s speech”
“They work out a lot!” was her reply.
I was preoccupied with the visual. That’s what a successful professional woman looks like.
Once upon a time I wanted to be a successful woman like that. I saw some of them when I interned at the DNC as a college student and returned after graduation to work for my congressman. I thought maybe I should go to law school. But, most women I met did not look like Michelle Obama. Most women did not carry themselves that tall. They wore suits to work, but their jobs were in reality sucky clerical jobs, or they had the titles but the job they got through connections (It was Washington, DC) was an uncomfortable fit. I never found a role model like Michelle Obama was said to be in the pre-speech DNC film. It would have been nice. I wore suits and carried high heel pumps in my shoulder strapbriefcase while I commuted in running shoes with white socks over my nylons. But, once I got do work, I didn’t know why I was there outside of a vague aspiration to do good work and be the kind of person who wore Anne Taylor suits to work every day.
Michelle Obama has a lot more going on.