The star of a president’s inauguration

Fr Martin Delaney reflects on a lasting conversation on a ‘cold sunny day in the US capital’

Forgive me for a bit of serious name-dropping this month! In December 2008, I received an invitation to attend the Inauguration of President Barack Obama in Washington DC. I was very excited to be part of such an historic occasion. January 20, 2009 was a very cold sunny day in the US capital and as I lined up to gain access to the section where I was assigned I began a conversation with a beautiful young African American woman who was walking alongside me.

An elderly couple were with her and I think they may have been her grandparents. When we got to our seats almost immediately people started to come up to the young woman to photograph her and some just stared at her. I was amused and curious because I had no idea who my obviously famous neighbour was.

Pop culture

My ignorance of pop culture prevented from recognising Alicia Keyes who actually was going to perform later that night at one of the many inaugural balls. While Alicia commanded all the attention I fell into a conversation with the man I presume was her grandfather. I could sense the excitement and emotion in this man as he witnessed the inauguration of the first black president of his country. He told me of how as a child and a young man growing up in the ‘south’ he had experienced such discrimination.

He recounted how as a young father he and his family were travelling one day and stopped to rest at a park beside the highway. His daughters spotted a slide set on a playground in the park and pulled their father towards the slide. They were too young to read the signs that warned that this playground was for ‘whites only’. He had to explain to his children why they could not play there.

They cried as they experienced racism for the first time. He described how he hugged his two little girls and said to them “listen, you little girls are somebody. In fact, you are so important and so valuable to God and so powerful that it takes the governor, the lieutenant governor and the whole state police force to keep you girls off that slide.”

He then told me of a little widow named Rosa Parks who one day started a revolution of civil rights by refusing to give up her seat on a bus because it was reserved for ‘whites only’.

Barack and Alicia may have been among the stars of that cold January day but for me the abiding memory will always be of the elderly African American man and his wife and the conversation we shared. For them, despite the bitter cold their hearts were on fire with excitement. I was reminded of those beautiful words from the Song of Songs:

See! The winter is past;
    the rains are over and gone.
Flowers appear on the earth;
    the season of singing has come,
the cooing of doves
    is heard in our land. 2:11-12

Mother knows best! A young Irish man living abroad calls home and excitedly tells his mother that he has fallen in love and plans to get married. He says, “Ma, I’m coming home for a visit with my fiancé and her two friends. For fun I will not tell you which one I’m going to marry and see can you guess which it is.” The mother agrees. The next week the son arrives home with three beautiful women in tow. They sit in the front room and chat for a while with the mother. The son then says, “Okay Ma, guess which one I’m going to marry” The mother immediately replies, “the one on the right”. “That’s amazing, Ma. You’re right. How did you know?”

The Irish mother replies, “I don’t like HER”.

A thought for November

Remember me when I am gone away,

Gone far away into the silent land;

When you can no more hold me by the hand,

Nor I half turn to go yet turning stay.

Remember me when no more day by day

You tell me of our future that you planned:

Only remember me; you understand

It will be late to counsel then or pray.

Yet if you should forget me for a while

And afterwards remember, do not grieve: