Singles Remind Me of Kisses, Albums Remind Me of Plans

There are two kinds of people -- there are those who think that everything fits into two categories, and then everybody else. We of that first set ike to sort information into simple binaries -- zero or one, on or off, good or bad, Democrat or Republican -- because it makes things so simple and easy to process. When something falls outside of one or the other, we say we are of two minds (or, as Al says, we feel very strongly both ways). That is, rather than locating ourselves outside of the binary system, we divide ourselves into both camps. So here are some things I feel two ways about:

1. There are people who raise doubts about whether Sarah Palin can handle the vice presidency with an infant (with Down Syndrome, though I don't feel that's a significant element to this argument) and a pregnant 17-year old. This is a valid concern, and one that may lead people to favor my preferred candidates, but at the same time I doubt the same thing would be said of a male candidate in a similar situation.

2. I feel, as my party does, that four years of a John McCain presidency is more than this country can afford but at the same time I think he's a decent, honorable, and well-intentioned politician. I disagree with many of his policies and I wonder about his intent to willfullly oppose the first viable African-American presidential candidate this country has produced, but I don't feel he should be attacked or lampooned in order to achieve an Obama presidency.

3. When I have an opportunity to enjoy a sandwich cookie -- whether Oreo, Hydrox, Nutter Butter, or what-have-you -- I like to deconstruct it into its various components, sometimes just to enjoy the inner bits separate from the outer bits, and sometimes to reconstruct a kind of hyper-cookie containing, say, three or four inner bits and two to three outter bits. At the same time, I recognize that the cookie is designed to be enjoyed at it is, and that one misses an essential kind of cookie experience when one messes about with its creators' intentions.

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Last Thursday evening, we attended a Convention Watching Party at the Pabst Theatre that was so powerful and moving to me that I still have a hard time describing it or writing about it. The crowd there was predominantly African-American and incredibly active, and there was definitely a sense of being a part of the Mile High Stadium experience (while also observing the experience.) In the video biography, there was a photograph of a very young Barack Obama sitting between his white grandparents, and it occured to me that, holy sh*t, that's our life, too. I've thought this and even argued it before, but these occurences were in the realm of the theoretical. But the picture hit home that my children -- for reals -- could become president. And then I thought about all the African-Americans sitting around me, and how for them this nomination might just indicate the same thing times 143 years (or 232 years, or even longer).

Obama has seemed to strategically avoid discussions of race in this election -- my wife even pointed out that, in the same biographic film I mention above, there were few pictures of blacks aside from those of the candidate and his wife -- so one wonders when, if ever, these kinds of moments might be legitimately recognized as being as monumental as they really are. I definitely take Obama's assertion that we (his supporters) are "on the right side of history," as being one of those codified recognitions that this is a crucial American moment.