The Torch Has Been Passed...

So much has happened that I am unsure where to begin. Let us start at the top...shall we?


How about this?? What an AMAZING thing that occured on election day. I am not talking about the election of the first black prez (although this is HUGE...but more on that later), but the excitement, the energy, the courage and the resiliancy that was shown...truly something special. I arrived to vote at around 5pm. The line was SOOOOOO long. It was raining. It was cold. BUT NO ONE...NOT ONE PERSON got out of line. I was standing in front of an elderly(85ish..) white woman who was with her son. They had brought a chair for her to sit in so she would not have to stand the whole time. Her son kept pursuading her to sit and she would say that she was fine. About an hour into standing in line, her son asked her why she was being so stubborn and she turned to him and said, "Paul! This country is in the trouble that it is because we have all been sitting on our asses for way too long. I'm done sitting down! It's time to stand up and move toward what we believe in!!" WHEW!!! This brought tears to my eyes and a lump to my throat.

Those of us born after the Civil Rights Movement have no first hand experience as to what it was like for our parents and grandparents during that time. But as I stood in line, I could feel the energy of those who did not live to see that day. Martin Luther King, Jr. John F Kennedy. Robert Kennedy. Rosa Parks. Obama's grandmother. My own grandmother. I could hear someone humming "We Shall Overcome" somewhere in line, though I never did figure out who it was...if it was coming from a present person at all.

All I can say is that I am so proud to have been part of that historic day. I am just sorry that I could not share it with those I love so much.

4 days after election day, I turned 31. I am getting old (so everyone keeps telling me). I don't feel any different. I am not one of those women who freaks out everytime their birthday comes along. OH NO!! I AM ONE YEAR OLDER!! WRINKLES! GRAY HAIR! Um, no. I kind of like aging. Racks up experience points that I hope I will be able to trade in someday. The only thing that even remotely bothers me about getting older is the fact that people frown upon someone my age (what???) acting like the child that I am. I touch stuff in stores. I play with things. I still wear my hair in a ponytail (ok, a nub, but whatever). I HATE wearing dresses as that means I have to shave my legs, which I hate as well. Some people will not go to a toy store with me because I will embarrass them. I am a 31 year old child. Some people forget that playing keeps us young. Makes us feel alive. If more people played, there would be less crime and hate because those things don't exist when you are taking turns pushing each other on the swings.

I have been a knitting and crocheting MACHINE!!!! A MACHINE I TELL YOU!!!!
I am working on a beautiful shawl for my sister in law who keeps complaining that her office is the arctic tundra. No worries mate! Help is on the way!!

I am also working on Mr. Greenjeans, which I have renamed Mrs. Brownjeans because I am no conformist and, quite frankly, it sounds better. Will post pics of both tomorrow.

I am having dinner with my beautiful sister this evening then we are off to Stitch n bitch so I had better pretend to accomplish something other than plurking and blogging so my husband thinks I still deserve the $100 GIFT CERTIFICATE TO MY LYS that he gave me for my birthday.

My life is rough.

Le *sigh*

I leave you with this:

I say to you today, my friends, so even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit down together at the table of brotherhood.

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a state sweltering with the heat of injustice, sweltering with the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day, down in Alabama, with its vicious racists, with its governor having his lips dripping with the words of interposition and nullification; one day right there in Alabama, little black boys and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls as sisters and brothers.

I have a dream today.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the South with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with a new meaning, "My country, 'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring."

And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!

Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!

Let freedom ring from the curvaceous slopes of California!

But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!

Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!

Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let freedom ring.

And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"

Martin Luther King Jr

August 28th, 1963