Change has come

What an exciting and fun evening last night. I had been waiting eight long years for this. Ruben, Mark, and I had dinner at Comet, then hunkered down at my condo at about 7:30 p.m. CT watching CNN, MSNBC, and NBC coverage of the returns. It was encouraging when they called Pennsylvania for Obama, but our first real inclination that it was going to be a great night came when they called Ohio for Obama. It became pretty clear by 9:30 p.m. CT that once the polls closed on the west coast, they could call the whole thing for Obama. And, of course, that is exactly what happened. It was surreal at 10:00 p.m. CT when the networks announced that Obama was president-elect. We opened a bottle of champagne, toasted our new president-elect, and watched history being made on TV. We drained the bottle of champagne in a half-hour, sat back, and watched the speeches.

I thought that Obama's speech was excellent. And how fun to see his daughters in addition to Joe Biden's elderly mother. Congratulations, president-elect Obama and vice president-elect Biden! To give credit where credit is due, McCain showed a lot of dignity and grace in his concession speech. I must admit that I loved seeing Sarah Palin get all teary-eyed at how the vast majority of the USA repudiated her.

My good mood is tempered, however, by the news coming out of California this morning that Proposition 8 (banning gay marriage) looks like it will pass. Very sad.