Waiting by the Phone

If you are curious as to who took all the good parts of the Wednesday Washington Post from the copy behind the bar at Commissary today, it was me. There was an article about a famous Obama portrait going in the National Portrait Gallery, the barbarian hordes descending on DC, and a 19 year old soldier dying in a vehicle rollover in Iraq on Christmas Eve. Over the course of my afternoon breakfast, about five people came in to submit applications and interview for employment at the restaurant. Over Irish coffee, a man and a women next to me discussed scouring USAJOBS.com for a new position. The articles, events, and conversations this afternoon seemed oddly intertwined.

I stayed for an extra cup of coffee and to re-read the article on Army Spec. Stephen G. Zapasnik. I have been to Arlington National Cemetery. The grounds affords views of the city that called the men and women buried there to service. I have seen a military funeral from afar. I have not attended one. I think in the new year that it is about time I made an effort to get out and see one to pay homage to the fallen.

Obama now has the ear of military families, the unemployed, and soon the largest crowd DC has ever seen. I feel more connected to the political climate than ever before as the change rhetoric speaks directly to my immediate future. An article in the Post the other day mentioned high unemployment among those with college degrees. This might be the first time politics and the course of our nation directly affects an intelligent crop of youth since the chain of events following 9/11 called young enlisted soldiers and officers to war.

Courtesy of MoveOn.org, that Obama portrait is plastered all over buildings, store fronts, traffic light poles, and other public venues in DC. In the mounting enthusiasm for the inauguration, I am looking forward to the rhetoric used in the upcoming weeks by the new administration as it speaks to a populous ready to listen: a generation ready to be called. From my perspective, its a great time to offer a vision setting a course for a great many years to come. Something tangible for the nation to strive for over the next ten to fifteen years. There is one caveat: when you speak to a down and out population brimming with a renewed hope, they tend to remember promises made rather vividly.