At this moment, as I sit at my computer I am filled with hope. Hope for the future of this great country we live in, hope for answers to the pressing questions of our time, hope for generations yet to come. I know that some might think that I am one of the many, swept away on a tide of pomp, circumstance, and rhetoric, but they would be wrong.
I've thought and prayed a lot during the course of this election and in the days following it. I've researched platforms and searched my soul and made informed decisions rather than just going with my gut or heart.
I've listened to the chants of "Yes we can!" and I've looked at the posters encouraging me to hope. What I've realized is this: having hope doesn't just happen. Each of us must choose to have it.
Me? I'm choosing it.
I hope that President Obama will rise to the occasion and have the conviction and fortitude to be the man that we so desperately need him to be.
I am also hopeful in my belief that he is and will be.
I am filled with unabashed optimism when I read the words
"Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real, they are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this America: They will be met"
I believe he means it, and I'm willing to do my part in making it happen.
In these uncertain and frightening times, I'm comforted and empowered by a President who says
"Our challenges may be new, the instruments with which we meet them may be new, but those values upon which our success depends, honesty and hard work, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism -- these things are old.
These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history.
What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility -- a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character than giving our all to a difficult task.
This is the price and the promise of citizenship.
This is the source of our confidence: the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny."
I hear the ring of truth in my ears and feel it in my heart, and know that if we can put behind us our differences and choose to work together for a common goal, we can make this world a better place.
I am moved by the reminder of the humble beginnings of this country
"In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river.
The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood.
At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:
'Let it be told to the future world that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive, that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet it.'
America, in the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words; with hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come; let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations."
and feel a renewed responsibility for what it is now.
It's true. I watched the inaguration of our 44th President of the United States in a classroom filled with 15 and 16 year old students, and I was as wide eyed and trusting as any one of them.
I'm choosing to believe him.
I'm choosing to be hopeful.
Whether or not you voted for this man, I would hope that we could all hope and pray for his mind to be enlightened, his convictions to be true, and his courage to be unwavering.
Me? I'm choosing to hope that we will.
