It would be an ObamaNation

I'm sure that others have snickered to themselves as they imagined the millions of dollars they would've raked in after coining "It's an ObamaNation!" for the Obama '08 campaign slogan. But I haven't seen or heard it anywhere else, so I will continue to pretend that I'm the only person out of 12 billion that's come up with it. Try it... it's fun to say.

Last Wednesday, I joined an estimated 18,000 people in Denver who flocked to the University of Denver to see Obama speak, and it was a really memorable experience. It felt like an event-- I got up at 5:30 after a post-midnight bedtime, ate my little peanut butter sandwich as I drove through dark country roads to meet up with my mom and her two friends, and stood outside in 20 degree temperatures at 7:30 am hoping to be one of the thousands let in to see a presidential hopeful talk about the future.

After an agonizing couple of hours of moving about two feet at a time, there was a strange mob rush for the door, and after literally running up the steps and through unguarded metal detectors with thousands of others, two volunteers were shouting and steering the masses into a gymnasium. My mom's good friend, a soft-spoken kindergarten teacher, looked back at me with an apologetic look and mouthed the words, "I didn't drive all the way out here to stand in a gym". She was small enough to dart through the crowd toward the arena, but at 5'7", I was a much easier target for a frantic volunteer who grabbed me by the jacket. "Where do YOU think you're going?" she yelled in a deep tenor. "TO THE BATHROOM!" I squealed, as I twisted out of her grasp and ran down the hall. Lo and behold, the four of us made our way onto the floor and found ourselves about 100' away from the podium, where we were part of the political fervor for several hours. I was actually deeply moved that Caroline Kennedy chose to back Obama's campaign-- as a speaker, she was charmingly shy, and I thought that it was very courageous of her to come into the spotlight to support his presidential bid.

Politics aside, I should mention that I'm feeling kind of guilty for writing this at work... but I'm literally the only person here today, and I needed something to do during my lunch break.

Plus, politics goes well with a bowl of chicken fajita soup.

I've spent all morning working on my educational video script for "single parenting", entering entire scenes that look like:

"#25: B-roll happy family // child on camera, cute interview that says something to the effect of: "My mom does a good job being the breadwinner and simultaneously pursuing an education and taking care of her kids"

Something tells me that my filmmaking process is not up to par with The Masters yet.

On the subject of Cute Kids, the cutest little kid line that I've ever heard was at Joyce's 100th anniversary Bloomsday in Dublin-- the streets were packed with about 10,000 people enjoying Ulysses reinactments and Guinness early in the morning, and I passed two little Irish boys who were dressed in 6' tall plaster sunflower costumes. Their bodies were the 'stalks', with tiny holes cut out for their arms and faces, and they were awkwardly shuffling through the crowd, obviously frustrated with their inability to move at all.
"Well," one boy was saying to the other in the squeakiest Irish accent imaginable, "don't drop anythin' and you won't need to pick it up then!" The second boy was on the brink of tears as he tried to find room for his knees to bend, and the two enormous sunflowers shuffled their way down to the sausage vendor.

The thing I enjoy most about my work is that it's given me permission to tell myself that I really want kids someday, and it's okay for a twenty (almost) six year old female to want kids and still be a bachelorette pursuing her dreams. I felt very shy in college about considering this, because women are so beaten over the head about not getting pregnant at a young age, and I think on some level we start to get these crazy feminist messages about totally missing out on life once you procreate. Maybe I'm just jaded and weird... but it feels good to finally discover that I love the idea of having my own child someday, and I'm enjoying the fact that I've still got some Selfish Time(tm) left while I start mulling that possibility over.

I've had "mimi smartypants" link on this blog for the past year (http://smartypants.diaryland.com/080125_23.html) because I've really enjoyed reading her accounts of being a mom and just appreciating the hell out of her kid-- her daughter Nora is adopted from China, and gives me hope that some little girls out there still love Superman and feel nauseous in the presence of bratty princess types. Despite the fact that I don't know her and it's always weird to read someone's journal to the point of wanting to call them up and say "I *know*, don't you just hate it when people say that to you at work??", I feel very inspired having read someone's thoughts for two years whose experience is close to my own-- she's taught me that you can be a mom and still read books for breakfast, lunch & dinner; still be sassy and snarky and bar-hopping and indie-music-listening; still rent interesting films and have dinner parties with your friends.

It probably sounds stupid, but after many years of seeing people my age practically abandoning their kid in the pursuit of their own interests, or staying home with kids who would make the Super Nanny cringe, it's a relief to hear someone talking about their child's love of books and learning and playgrounds, and read a possible future in which I could be reading Don Delillo on the couch with Reading Rainbow playing on tv. I think I just really resonate to hearing someone say-- I'm a parent, and my life didn't come to a screeching halt when I had a kid... I have the pleasure of having someone small and very wonderful come along for the ride, and now I get to watch her life take shape.

Not that I want to have kids right this second. I mean, come on, I'm at work and everything. Oops, and six minutes over my lunch break.
I think I'll excuse myself on the basis that I'm the only person who feels that showing up on Fridays might actually be productive for business...

Oops again, for accidentally ending on a catty note.
Oh, and totally unexciting announcement, but sometime today or this weekend I'm supposed to have a new essay on dad's website. http://www.dansimmons.com/news/jane.htm
His website had some down-time with a switcheroo of "web maevens" (GROSS! it's as bad as the term "blogging!" I picture a bunch of wenches in leather corsets sitting around writing HTML)...
but after "THE TERROR" had sooooo much success last year, I'm absolutely thrilled that he's two seconds away from finishing "DROOD". I must admit that I thought the title for a historical fiction thriller about Charles Dickens did not work, but I saw the new "Drood" cover yesterday and it's *amazing*. An old sepia photograph of a man in top hat & cloak, super close up to his shoulders, with Big Ben barely peeking out in front of him.

Ok. Now I'm officially 12 minutes over my lunch break and I feel like a jerk.
Check out the new essay, because I finally admitted to a life-long dependency of my Veruca Salt obsession.

au revoir,
je lit le petit prince quand je travaille de temps en temps
(*I read The Little Prince from time to time when I'm working)