My first political memory is that of Nixon’s resignation, when I was around the same age as my older nephews and niece, so of course I was eager to find out their impressions of the new president, curious as to whether the great outpouring of sentiment we felt as a nation a few weeks back would serve to shape their political consciousness in a way that the shame of Watergate had marked mine more than three decades ago.
I first reached out to my sister’s two boys, five and seven, who are growing up in the commonwealth of Virginia, a state boasting a storied political history, producing seven founding fathers and eight notable presidents. This year Virginians of all stripes stepped up to the plate and played a decisive role in sending another fine gentleman to the White House, and I wanted my nephews to understand the tradition of enlightened civic responsibility they were inheriting by dint of their provenance.
My nephew Teddy, the future frat rat, had already honored the tradition with charming aplomb. This summer, in fact, when I first told Teddy about Obama, the name had lodged itself in that mysterious part of a little boy’s brain that is obsessed with scatological functions and nothing but. He actually made up some raps about the candidate, in particular preferring to recite this little gem after reaching up his sister’s dress and pulling off her diaper in strategically designated locations:
“My name is Obo and I like to go-go. I like to go-go on the neighbor’s front porch”
“My name is Obo and I like to go-go. I like to go-go on the living room rug”
(Gentle reader, you get the picture)
His older brother, like our new leader, is a of a much more thoughtful nature, and his inherent sensitivity generally provides the balance to Teddy’s posturings, so I was quite convinced that a conversation with him would offer a more nuanced assessment of the historical threshold we had crossed.
“Hey buddy, isn’t it exciting about the new president?”
“Not really,” he replied, his voice dripping with a disappointment I hadn’t heard since Tom Brady fell from grace in the last Superbowl. “I wanted McCain to win.”
I wasn’t terribly surprised. His father, after all, is a Republican, and seven-year-old-boys are easily influenced by their fathers. But his father is also clueless and, as the cool New York Aunt, I have always considered it one of my greatest tasks to ensure that my southern nephews are exposed to good old-fashioned northeastern elitism liberalism to counterbalance their more provincial conservative upbringing.
“Really? Why? Obama is so young and cool? Wouldn’t you rather have a president who’s young and cool, like you?”
“No, I think Obama’s mean”
This was a new one. I refrained from pointing out the mean things some of the treasured adults in his own life have done, like the time his mother stole my favorite pair of jeans and turned them into cutoffs simply because I held her down while the dog licked the inside of her mouth. Instead, I continued my course of gentle prodding.
“Really buddy? I’m sorry you think that. What did he do that you think was so mean?”
“I dunno, like, he, like, said bad things about McCain and stuff.”
“Ok, maybe sometimes he did, but sometimes McCain said bad stuff too. That’s what politicians do. It’s a game. They say mean things so they can win, but when the campaign is over they go back to Washington and become friends again.”
“Well, that’s not a very nice way to play.”
(Ouch. I know it’s important to raise them to play well with others, but if this kid didn’t toughen up I envisioned a rocky future with nothing but heartbreak in store. I decided to put it in terms he would understand.)
“Look, you remember how sad you got after the Patriots lost the Superbowl, and Daddy told you the Giants simply played a better game? The presidential election is a lot like the Superbowl. Obama wasn’t meaner than McCain, he just played a better game.”
He was quiet for a moment, contemplating the fact that I had placed the election on the same cultural plane as the Superbowl.
“I’m going to Washington at Thanksgiving to see the Redskins play the Giants,” he concluded and, with that, his preference clear, the conversation was over.
My sister then grabbed the phone and, always quick to defend her favored first born, cut off my looming lecture in her don’t-you-dare-talk-to-me-about-politics-right-now-the-only-change-I’m-concerned-with-is-the-twins’-diapers tone:
“Look, he only wanted McCain because he was always losing. You know he likes to favor the underdog.”
(Clearly, if the kid plans on rooting for the Redskins over the Giants)
I knew I’d have a more positive discussion with my brother’s two kids, who are growing up in Cambridge Mass, and if Virginia was the incubator of our democracy, then Massachusetts provided its spark. After all, where would Thomas Jefferson be if those disgruntled Yankees had not seen fit to dump tea in Boston Harbor. Plus my brother, who’s a big
Lucas, the slightly-too-advanced-he’s-at-risk-of-becoming-as-dorky-as-his-father first grader, and (if his mother has her way) future MIT grad, could not contain his excitement: “Obama got 365 and McCain only got 162 so that means Obama won by more than double. That’s very, um…significant!”
(Cleary sis-in-law had been working the at-home flash card action)
“What did you think of his speech?” I asked.
“I loved it. It was so good. He said all the right things and I really liked the way he said them.”
“What did you think of McCain’s speech?”
“It wasn’t so good. He had no passion.”
“What do you think about Tom Brady having to sit out the season?”
“Who?”
In the background, his little sister was practicing for her career in the public eye by insisting in increasingly piercing tones that it was her turn to speak and, as usual, Lucas had no choice but to capitulate.
“Hi Aunt Kate,” she whispered into the phone, immediately reverting to the breathy Marilyn Monroe voice she is prone to employ the moment she gets her way. I make a note to myself to work on channeling her innate ability to manipulate from both ends of the emotional spectrum for good (like a career in journalism) and not evil (like a career in journalism) when she gets older.
“Hola Camila. Did you like Obama’s speech?”
“I liked the little girls. I wanted them to stay. McCain didn’t have any little girls. Why didn’t McCain have any little girls? The little girls were wearing pretty dresses.”
(Ok Barbie, time for bed, when you’re ready for your close up we’ll talk, but right now I’ve got important business to discuss with your brother.)
My nephew got back on.
“Lucas do you know what’s so special about Barack Obama?”
“Yes, he’s the first Native American President!”
(Wow, good at math and an imagination to boot – this kid is going places!)
“Close, he’s the first African American President.”
“What?”
“That means he’s the first President who’s black.”
“Oh. So?”
A Neighborhood that Resembles Sesame Street far More than Main
Ok, so this is probably the point where I should conclude with a heartwarming from the mouths-of-babes-such-wisdom-sprouts caveat and, sure, it’s pretty damn cool that in Lucas’ short lifetime he has already seen a black man elected mayor of his city, and another one governor of his state, so why shouldn’t he think it no big deal that one is now the president-elect. But the cynic realist in me also looks at the rarefied world he is being raised in and sees a bubble that, however desirable, is still highly unreal, a neighborhood that resembles Sesame Street far more than Main. He lives in a bilingual household with hovering, hyper-educated parents; attends a progressive public school where his class picture resembles a meeting of the midget delegation to the United Nations; and he counts among his friends and neighbors the child of a tech multimillionaire, the child of a nationally renowned novelist, and the child of a cop.
It’s hard for me to not compare that world to the one where my other nephews are being raised—an economically privileged suburb of a city that remains one of the most segregated in the country, where they attend a private school that divides its classrooms between the Jacksons and the Lees, and the only dominant ethnic minorities in their lives are the folks who baby sit for their younger brother and sister, clean their house and provide the labor at their father’s business.
Ultimately, most in this country really do not occupy such polarized enclaves and, for me, one of the more significant aspects of Obama’s victory is not necessarily that he needed the support of voters like my brother and his ilk in Cambridge to win, but that he was able to win a state like Virginia without needing the votes of elites from the other extreme. Right now, when the family gathers and my nephews meet in the middle, they are of course blithely unaware about their different lifestyles and are united by far more important matters, like the various ways in which they can torture Camila. And I’d like to think that, as all the kids get older, they can maintain that middle, and find other common ground—whether around politics, sports, pop culture or something else—that won’t serve to highlight the gaps between how they were raised, and that won’t always involve making girls cry (especially since, by then, Camila likely will have had her close up, and will definitely have left all of them in the dust…)