The Day Arrives

Yes, it's quite the occasion. Who might ever have imagined that such an event could take place in a nation that has so divided itself across colour lines? That a people whose humanness has been so drearily exploited by those of another colour distinguishing them as lesser beings, could finally look to the dream sequence of what has transpired in the last six months on the political front.

The event is monumental in the sense that a man of black mixed heritage has so distinguished himself on the national stage and inspired so many across racial and societal lines that he has been elevated by popular opinion to take residence in the Oval Office. His self-assurance and professed love for country and the people who have inherited its history lead many to believe in his promise.

While it's true that after a miserable and harrowing history, blacks have finally managed to establish their own social, literary, cultural, political and financial hierarchy and aristocracy, not even the accomplished and privileged among them might have imagined this coming day. It ranks as an event of divine intervention for many, establishing a promising era of justice and equality of opportunity.

It is astonishing in and of itself, that the country could turn itself inside out and discover on the inside a willingness to recognize the full equality of those who were once so shamefully degraded and demoralized and terrorized. The journey has been long, arduous and dangerous. Leaving behind a history littered with corpses.

And the never-forgotten national tragedy of a civil war where idealists, humanists and those of religious conviction in the brotherhood of man fought against those who were complacent in the status quo, whose fortunes were reliant on the tragic enslavement of the unfortunate many whose skins were black. So it's time, and about time.

That the acclaim wafting from the international community toward America may portend a healing of relationships so badly sundered by the recent administration is undeniable. That the world looks on with great anticipation through the window of the house of America speaks volumes about the global need for a resolute and justly rational leader.

Yet it's also true that so much hope has been placed on the anticipation for change that Barak Obama has promised, that he has been garlanded with the status of a supra-being, one whose accomplishments may solve all the ills that society faces in these days of insecurity and universal unease for the future.

He does not himself appear to be unduly troubled by the heavy weight that will all too soon descend on his shoulders; like Atlas he will struggle to balance tremendous expectations that no single individual could ever possibly hope to bring to fruition. Solutions to the seemingly unsolvable problems besetting the world community may be far more elusive than hope would have us believe.

Promising a puppy to two beloved daughters is one thing. Bringing the world on track to a better future is fraught with all manner of pitfalls. He understands this, as his acceptance speech in Chicago indicated in no uncertain manner, but it hardly seems that those who elected him and who have tied their hopes to the frail wings of his poised but untried governance, do.

Time and the tides wait for no man, and he will be swept along on the backwash of world events and history just like any other mortal. It is how he manages to navigate the storms and heavy seas on the way that will mark his presence for the future.