Empowered Mama

Last week I got this invitation in the (e) mail inviting me to a pre-inaugural pot-luck brunch:

Mamas, please join us as we break bread and hold sacred space for
mothers to celebrate and dialogue about our dreams, what inspires us,
and what kind of change we want to see for our family, our community,
and for ourselves.

Filming will take place as part of a new web series for
Empowered Mama.

Now how cool is that?

Alas, I could not go, because I am still sick-ish, and we only had one car, and it was turning into a big old pain. Michelle, our hostess promised there would be more. So i am trying not to mourn. But if I had been able to attend this pre-inaugural brunch, this is what I would have said:

I think Barack Obama has punctured the cloud of selfishness that has engulfed our nation for the past decade or two. We all have selfishness in us, and our nation has chosen to go that route, over and over and over again. Everything has been about taking away, rather than giving back. It shows up from Wall Street, to how corporations screw the employees who are their lifeblood, to people cutting you off while they scream into their cell phones. You want to stand up to it, but it starts to get you down. And then someone comes along who asks you to do more, to give back, who inspires you and gives you a place to plug in. He doesn't sound paternalistic: listen little people, I am here to take care of you. No, he says, it is going to be hard, it is going to take a lot of work, but let's look forward, let's dream, let's have a vision, let's act as a community, not a bunch of splinter groups fighting against each other, and let's make our schools, our hospitals, our environment, our families, better. He is asking us to bring out our better selves, and that request alone, that example alone, has already changed America. I do not heap upon him all expectations. He has already made compromises I wish he hadn't. We need so much change no single person could do it all. BUT, he is trying. He is not afraid to try. He has spoken his mind and held the line, and not bowed down, and done the seemingly impossible just in winning the election. And that already puts so much hope back into the whole world--not just America. I am grateful not just that he is going to make change, but that he is asking us all to be part of it.

When I get the site for the Empowered Mama webcast I will post it HERE!