Day 39

I went to the University of Idaho campus last night to see the Reverend Jesse Jackson speak to a crowd of over 4,500. We were packed to the rafters in the Kibbie Dome. I met friends from graduate school before hand for dinner. They smiled at my naivety when I told them that I was going to see Reverend Jackson, in part, because I wanted to reconnect with that moment over 2 years ago when it was announced that Barack Obama would be the next president.

Like most people I was moved by the reactions of the crowd that gathered in Chicago to hear the president-elect speak. But it was the tear-stained face of Jesse Jackson that brought tears to my own eyes. Written across his face was the story of struggle and success, success that required such unimaginable sacrifice. I was sure that no one could understand that sacrifice better than this man who was there that day in Memphis when Dr. King was struck down on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel.

I was not yet four years old on that day in 1968, yet I have always felt so connected to that time and place. I was born in 1964, the same year that the Civil Rights Act was signed into law and President Johnson launched the "War on Poverty." No one at home or at school ever talked to me about civil rights. But I grew up with a keen eye for injustice and a love of democracy: the brand of democracy that says that all people are created equal.

At some point, as I got older, I came to see these notions of justice and democracy as simple and naive, too unsophisticated for an educated woman like myself. And yet, just pecking these words out on the keyboard brings tears to my eyes again. I used to see myself as a freedom fighter but somewhere along the way I gave up the fight. Dr. Jackson's words last night poked at the embers of a fire I thought to be extinguished.

The question now is: what to do with this passion? The muse in me says write...