The ripples from the boulder dropped into the pool of global consciousness from Tuesday’s election have even made their way out to rural Hokkaido.

In Japan time, the results became official Wednesday afternoon.  As my work day was finishing up, I dashed around the internet reading all I could about what’d happened and the USA reaction.  Reading about the jubilation across America’s bars, churches, black, white and pink communities gave the top of my spine a strange tingle.

This is only the second time politics has given me that feeling – usually ususally it comes from a novel or fingers from a particularly paritcularly special member of the gentler sex – the first being Bush’s speech after 9/11.  It is something about my jaded attitude, raised spoiled in an America that was unquestionably unquestinably #1 in seemingly everything, and invincible until then.  This produced a sort of political ambivalence for me, that resulted in me not really caring at all, spending far more mental energy pondering what steps Jerry Krause should take to rebuild the Bulls.

Aside, from the Bulls being past rebuilding not too much has changed.  Watching around 80% of the Presidential and VP debates this time around and doing some reading is 100% more research/energy than I have ever put into politics before.  Still far from filling my responsibility as a citizen.

Following that speech from Bush, even from afar I grew very disillusioned with him and the rest of the US government that followed his whims.  It centered around lying to a nation to get us involved in Iraq when we were at our most vulnerable, most trusting and most needing of guidance.  I effectively felt like an intellectual rape victim afterwards and had little interest in making myself vulnerable again.

Thus, I never and still don’t love Obama or see him as anything more than a far better alternative than McCain and Bush.  The bigger issue for me is that a minority was peacefully elected the leader of the free world.  Please correct me if I’m wrong, but I think that’s the first time its happened, ever.  It is the most complete realization of the American dream I have seen in my lifetime.

I’ve never been ashamed to be American, but it was the first time I really felt proud, instead isntead of indifferent.

Today were my first classes post-election.  When I gave a short lesson on the elections today, I gave a brief explanation of the term limits of Presidents and the Electoral College.  I finished on the importance of a minority rising to power in the USA.  I struggled for words to express why this mattered, and ended by stealing steling Barack’s campaign slogan, that things will “change.”

My 14 year old student looked at me with eyes full of wonder …

about when I would shut up and she could get downstairs for lunch.

Aside from my horrendous lesson, I have been surprised by how many people have brought it up to me.  Over dinner last night my friend surprised suprised me after beers had been poured, instead of kanpai I got “Obama.”

Today when I told a student we were going to “change” our warmup, the Japanese English Teacher blurted out “Obama!”

The Buddhist priest in town mentioned Barack’s rally in Chicago, knowing that’s where I’m from, and one of the bus drivers who speaks no English and almost never talks to me walked up to me today and started going off.  I understood “Obama” and assumed/hope he was expressing some sort of congratulations.

Finally, got laughs yesterday and multiple times today with the fact that my supervisor’s looks just like Barack,

Not only did I vote in the most important election of my lifetime via absentee, I even got a picture with a Japanese dude whose name, “Obara” slightly resembles Obama’s.

OK, I was lying about the looking like him part.