Election Day 2008: Finally the End

All evening I had been screaming with delight as each state was called for Obama. Pennsylvania set the tone in the room as my daughter and son-in-law, both previously Bush supporters, joined in the celebration. My phone rang every few minutes as friends and family called to share the excitement. I had control of the remote and channel-flicked nervously from MSNBC to CNN, to the three major networks, and back again to MSNBC. Could I allow myself to feel a glimmer of hope when hope had been crushed so many times in the past eight years?
I glanced at my normally vocal partner and saw only a clenched jaw. Things were looking really good, I thought. Why won't she let herself enjoy the moment? It's true that she and I are different in many ways, especially our political backgrounds. She was born and raised in the lower tip of Illinois, a very "southern" area, and had been a lifelong Democrat seeing bigotry and hatred with a front row seat. I on the other hand was the granddaughter of Italian immigrants and Missouri pig farmers, all staunch Republicans who had settled and merged in Southern California. I had been a Republican until '92 when my party decided to spout vitriolic hate speech aimed at gay America. That's the moment when I began to let go of my Republican identity and get involved in the political process as I redefined myself.
So here we were, Democrats in common yet completely differing in reaction as the evening unfolded state by state. And then that magic hour arrived when the polls closed on the west coast. 8:00 PM. I had landed on MSNBC and clutched her hand as it was announced: Barack Obama would become the 44th president of the United States. The chatter stopped as the cameras alternated from Chicago to New York to California and even to Kenya. I was crying. The world was crying! No one called on the phone as we all savored this glorious moment in history that was unfolding before our eyes. Yet the woman whose hand I clutched so joyfully was still eerily silent.
"Are you okay," I asked as I tried to break through the wall she had erected.
She sat still for one moment longer, and then the tears finally welled up in her eyes. She said softly and simply, "The Civil War is finally over."