As far as speeches go, this one is pretty amazing. For it's content, it's delivery and what it went on to stand for in the American psyche.



In 2013, my hope and prayer is that this speech, along with President Obama's Inaugural address today will resonate in our hearts and minds for longer than just the emotional moments in which they were delivered.

Thoughts? Please, let me know in the Facebook or Disqus comment sections below. We can also talk about it on Twitter at @EPayneTheDad.

So, I was going to post a nice, happy frivolous post today, a Friday. Instead, I turned on my computer and was stunned to see that President Obama has been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

This isn't a political blog so my reasons for being stunned are mine and I have no desire to share/impose them. But the Web 2.0 in me simply won't allow me not to call attention to this event in real time for the sake of a post about a loaf of bread.

Stay tuned.

Never Miss A Post

I think I'm a couple days late on this. I've been very busy with the in-laws as of the past 3 days.

I hope something isn't wrong with me when I say I don't care that Ashley Biden, daughter of new V.P. Joe Biden, was allegedly filmed snorting cocaine at a party.

I remember growing up and hearing about all the wild stuff that PKs (preacher's kids) did. I can't speak about mainstream America, but most black people I knew shook their heads and their fingers at the situation and wished the best for the wayward child. No one really spent too much time condemning the parent. Why? I believe most people understood back then that the children of these parents of influence and authority felt they needed to rebel against the overwhelming pressure of being in such a household. No different than any other kid that rebels. Of course, a parent can often overlook a very bad situation in lieu of their own career, but the former just seemed obvious. And just to assure you that this isn't some liberal defense on my part, I thought it was awful that Sarah Palin's daughter, Bristol, got dragged through the media. At such a vulnerable and critical time in a young woman's life - embarking on motherhood with the odds against you - no one deserves what she got.

Even as I got older my mother began to say, "I refuse to talk about some other person's child, when I'm not yet sure what my own child is capable of." My mother was telling me right from wrong every second of my life, but that didn't stop me from making an ass of myself when the time came for me to act.

A kid's missteps are just that, missteps (as well as the big ones), not a national argument for hypocrisy on the part of the parent (although the parent(s) would be wise not to pass judgment on other people's children also). I don't believe it's my place, nor anyone else's, to pass judgment.

What do you think?

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It was impossible to not write about the campaign and election of Barack Obama as our 44th President. No matter how hard I tried. I do try to stay away from politics as it has become quite the circus (maybe it always has been). But...

When I was at Cornell and I mentioned I was from Chicago people always made reference to the crime and the corruption of the Al Capone days. To this day people always say/ask, "Chicago. Bang bang?" I laugh and tell them that was back in the 30's. Well, if you count a handful highly publicized scandals involving some governors, legislators and this guy below, maybe they knew something I didn't.



Why in the world did this poor, old man allow himself to be thrown under the bus like this? He's had a 30-year career of service. Do you think anyone is going to remember him for that now?



My dad is Burris' age and every time I watch him speak I shake my head for his generation. And is that the ghost of Harold Washington sitting next to him at Blago's impeachment trial?



The "Real" Roland should have run the other way when Blago stepped to him. Unless he got a note from the doctor saying he had 30 days to live he could've figured out a way to throw his hat in the ring after they threw that clown out. I don't care what the issues are back home, I don't care about Senator Reid's power plays, the undercurrent of racism everywhere in Chicago and Illinois, the fact that every African American who wanted to be considered for Obama's vacated seat was said to be passed over. Maybe something's wrong with me because I say, "Pass me over!" Who needs the drama? I'm just waiting for the press conference where he strokes out on national television from the stress.

Sorry, but Burris should've NEVER accepted the appointment. Now he's a punching bag for every enemy Blago has ever had on both sides of the aisle. Damn an agenda, he's gonna spend the next two years defending his credibility, or the next 30 days depending on how much public opinion turns against him.

It just ain't right.

Blago's got one hell of a punch. The punch that just won't stop punching.

After a recent visit to BlackAndMarriedWithKids.com I commented on the blog post, Does Parenthood Make You Lame? The following was my answer:

I believe this is something my wife suffers from more than I, although you’d never be able to tell it by looking at her. And maybe because of archetypal, outmoded roles, women feel this more or internalize it more than men. I’m not exactly sure.

But being at the club has nothing to do with swagger or cool. In fact although going out to dance is cool every once in a while, but the regulars at the club (specifically one club they always go to) looking for the same old same week after week is beyond lame. But chillin’ at a lounge or a swank restaurant is something I truly enjoy.

I believe swagger begins internally - it is a state of mind - it has to be otherwise it is nothing but an act that fades over time and real swagger is not an act. A few years ago when I knew I was going to be a dad (my biological first, I have a teenage stepson) I was quite panicked about the whole thing. I happened to read an article in GQ magazine that put fathers into about 6 categories. The one that resonated with me the most was Prada Dad, the father everyone wants to know and be. In fact the Prada Dad is so cool, he makes childless men want to be fathers, and women — well I don’t need to go into that here.

President Obama (currently the king of swagger) has swagger for days and talks about his kids. Brad Pitt can’t seem to have kids fast enough and he’s got swagger, shouting them out every chance he gets. Will Smith has swagger and he’s an outspoken family man. And the modern day father of swagger, Denzel - well do I need to say more? I don’t even have to say his last name and you know who I’m talking about. Now all of these men are celebrities and they have plenty of money and help, but unlike plenty of other men who are celebrities and acting a fool and keeping their kids secret, you know these men are parents and they are proud about it. It actually adds to their cool.

But to answer the question do I feel I’m as cool as I was before I had kids? No. Because it’s a different cool. I’m not stupid cool anymore. I’m really cool — that grown man cool that will last over the years, like a classic muscle car. And why do I maintain my cool? For my kids. I want my kids to know I’m cool so that they know they can always come to me for anything. I want to be their superhero, their supercool dad that they’re not horrified to see when I pick them up from school. And I don’t want that to change as they grow older and wiser.

In my travels and at work when it come out that I’m a father and even I’m the age that I am, people look at me almost bewildered. “But how?” “What are you doing…?” “You don’t look like a…?” And because I am a parent of a baby I barely get any sleep and I feel like I’m being run ragged on many days. But that doesn’t mean I have to wear that for the world to see. This is my badge of courage and I wear it proudly (well). The problem is that being a parent or married person over time has come to be associated with looking like behind on a stick. And that’s the real problem.

Swagger is a state of mind. It begins with you and it is determined by you. Parenthood can’t mess with that. It should in fact enhance it.

Does being a father/parent mean you're not supposed to have swagger?

Does being a father/parent prevent you from having swagger?

And if you've got it (swagger) how do you maintain it?

Happy Monday!

This amazing week is finally coming to a close. Usually the days fly by for me, but each day has been different and unique during this special week of January 2009. One of the fantastic things about personal blogging is you can look back over time and literally read about your own growth and development. By clicking my Barack Obama tag you can see my evolution from mild skeptic to true believer.

Yesterday I broke down watching the above video of President Obama addressing the State Department (I spared you the whole 11+ minutes with the above clip). Watching him there talking, saying nothing other than what he was supposed to say (but oh, so eloquently) as the President of the United States just made ALL OF THIS so very real.

And there's no turning back now.

"Forwards ever, backwards never," as the saying goes in my fraternity.

Happy Friday, y'all. What a wonderful week.

PS - Check out Brookey's Blogspot. Today, I'm blogging about President Barack Obama's charge to all of us.

On Tuesday night at MTV's Youth Inaugural Ball Kanye West made some comments about Bush.





What I managed to take from this showcase of jumbled thoughts is that Kanye suddenly realized that Bush, despite himself, was a human being. Following on the general emotive train he's been on since his new album dropped, Mr. West seemed to genuinely lament that this man did not do more or didn't do enough to secure a positive legacy as the now previous most powerful man in the world.

But just to showcase how human "W" was please view below:





I nearly fall out of my seat every time I see this.

Peace.

PS - What's up with dude's shag?

There were several mistakes I readily admit regarding my uselessness role in the Obama candidacy for President:

• When asked several times by several people to get involved - people who are aware of my qualifications and ability to organize and mobilize, I didn't. I had my reasons back in 2007 that reached all the way into the middle of 2008. But I can't tell right now what they were. Not even if I tried hard. Translation: I had no excuse. Who knows what doors I could have opened by building relationships with people from all over this nation (or at least the state of New York)? Now, I'll never know. Or rather, I'll have to wait until a similar opportunity comes around. If it comes around.

• On the night of his historic election, my wife and I began planning how to get involved; how to get down to D.C. to be a witness to history. Fast forward to last week when nearly everyone we know began their exodus from New York to D.C. we sat by in a morass of indecision and inaction rooted in the fact that the Inauguration on it's face didn't seem very kid-friendly (at least not in the baby department). I'm sure had we tried hard enough we could've found a way around this and several other minor bumps in our quest to be an eyewitness to history. But we did not. We settled for nothing.
  

Stewing in a funk of my own creation I lamented over this debacle I brought on myself and decided that somehow, no matter what, I was not going to sit on a couch by myself watching a television on Inauguration Day. I set my Facebook status offering (begging) to connect with friends. I sent a text message out to as many people as I could to see if they'd be willing to indulge in a day of history and camaraderie.

To spare you the responses I got, everyone said no. As I struggled with the reality that I was going to spend yet another momentous occasion alone, I began to think of my family. I didn't want my son sitting up in a classroom with a teacher I really don't know explaining to him what was going on. I not only wanted him to be amongst people who represent the spectrum of ethnicities that represent America, but I really wanted him to be around men that look like his father and himself. I wanted him to see and feel the power of that collective body en masse as I have at various points in my own life.

My wife was convinced our daughter would be oblivious, and besides, she contended, it was too cold. Our daughter has been calling Obama's name since before we ever mentioned it to her. She runs to his picture on the television and recognizes his voice on the radio. As we were discussing it babygirl screamed, "Pres-dent Barrack OOhbama!" There was no way I wasn't taking her with me.

So with no real plan, I kept my son home from school and my daughter home from daycare and headed down to Harlem. I was intent on experiencing something.

I landed on 125th Street at 11:30 in the morning with my daughter riding piggyback and joined the crowd at the State Building on Adam Clayton Powell Boulevard.








We remained here until President Barack Hussein Obama (#44) was sworn in.






The next stop was Amy Ruth's, a few blocks away, for some soul food. I met up with friends and their family. My baby --- after being angelic at the swearing in --- decided to go through personality 1 - 13 at the table. But I was happy to see my too-cool son being social.




Our last stop on this historic day was the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. All six of us and my daughter, now asleep after her wild lunch, walked the exhibition hall looking at a collection a great photos covering the President's historic run from the time that he announced his candidacy, through to November 4, 2008.





By night's end my children and I enjoyed a great day in Harlem soaking up the history of this Presidential Inauguration and the culture of the community. I repeatedly told my children I loved them. My daughter told me she loved me back. My son just looked at me. But that's okay. I did the same thing when I was his age.

My one regret was not being able to share the day with my wife, especially since I had our kids with me. She had to work and couldn't get uptown in time to meet me. I tried to meet her after work and that didn't go well either, so apparently it wasn't meant to be. I visited my mother-in-law, since I couldn't visit my own in Chicago, hugged and kissed her, watched some of the parade, and chatted with her briefly about the future before heading home.

At the end of the night, my daughter, pigtails fried and frazzled after a day out with daddy, summed it up best (without too much coaching) on my grainy, awful webcam:




Enough said.

If you're on Twitter or Facebook, it would seem as if the entire nation is in D.C. right now. But for those of us who aren't there, today is a day off from work. It's a great day to clean up the house, watch your favorite DVDs, shovel snow, watch CNN (for what's going on in D.C.), go to the mall for one of those infuriating MLK sales that just can't be beat or just simply be a bum.

But seriously, on the day that is national recognized as the King Holiday and on the eve of one of the most significant Inaugurations in history and clearly the most exciting one in decades, President-Elect Obama has asked that renew our nation, by making "enduring commitments to our neighborhoods" through service. This is something that is very close to my heart that began for me when I was a little boy attending a little Methodist Church in Chicago.

To sweeten the deal, President-Elect Obama's taken most of the guesswork out of his challenge by launching: USAService.org. Here you can find where, when and and how to donate your time, talents, goods and sweat-equity. Or you can host an event yourself. I love it!

Check it out: USAService.org

Peace.

It's low budget, but hey you gotta start somewhere.

Barack Obama has been President-Elect for the past few days now and I still can't get anywhere on time. I was mostly late to work last week. For unGodly reasons that were out of my control I had to work late on Friday night, I got home incredibly late that evening because the trains hate me, and I overslept this morning and missed out on getting myself and my family off to church.

Over these same few days my thinking has and continues to undergo a transformation of sorts, of which the results are something which I'm not sure of yet.

Bits and pieces are coming to me in the middle of the day, first thing in the morning, while listening to a song, sitting on the toilet...you get the idea.

One thing my mind has visited in these days is the skirmish I had with my wife over the summer. Those of you who were on the blog at the time know it was about my wife's decision to ship my daughter off to my parents for the summer without even trying to discuss it with me. For all the gory/pointless details, click here.

What I can say right here and now is that I wish I hadn't resorted to anger. I was disappointed to the point of devastated that my wife didn't feel she could talk to me about this, but that's where it should have stayed. It was on me to flesh it out, seek out the problems and get to the answers and fix it so it wouldn't return. Instead, I chose to go ballastic --- educated, articulate and grown --- I allowed myself to be consumed with my anger and purposely stretched what should've been a long and insightful dialogue into a month-long conflict.

I could've used that energy in so many different ways. As I just said, I could've gotten to the root of the problem or found other ways if I couldn't do it myself, I could've prayed on it, I could've done some pushups, but I splashed it out here and walked a very thin line stopping just short of making a mockery out of my wife and my nascent marriage.

If I've learned anything over the past few days I've learned that I'm better than what I've been. Raised to know better and experienced enough to do better. I can't speak on "If I had it to do all over again I would've..." I'm no witch so I can't repredict the past.

I just wish I had done better because I am better.

So...where were you?

I've had a hard time not walking with a strut today. But to get completely spiritual...

How great God is that we were all a witness to this historic moment in time. Never in my lifetime and not even those of my children, did I expect to witness what I've previously dismissed as unattainable. I am blessed that my parents and my wife's parents and grandparents were a witness to this as well. But I'm sure those of us who are no longer with us are smiling down from heaven with smiles of joy for our joy.

As someone who has been a personal witness to many miracles, I must say I NEVER have I been so truly awed, stunned, silenced and humbled by the power of God.

My life will never be the same. And I pray the same is true for you.

After crying, slobbering, blubbering hysterically for at least 30 minutes, after dropping my video camera twice in the melee going on in my living room, after trying to get through to loved ones through blocked cell phone circuits, after tearfully embracing my wife, and tearfully telling my children they can be whatever they want to be, after leaving my Invisalign out for at least 5 hours because for the first time since I've gotten them I forgot to put them back in after I ate...

...I'm not even the slightest bit sleepy. I'm cracking open a bottle of wine and scooping out ice cream into a bowl. And I'm watching Obama speak in the park I used to have to run around at track practice when I was in high school.

And I'm rocking the best clothes in my closet to work tomorrow.

I'm taking a deep breath, soaking it all in...and I am oh so thankful, to My God and to my country and to one single figure who is being used to take us somewhere we've never been before --- Barack Hussein Obama.

We shall overcome, we have overcome, and we will continue to overcome...

...All of us!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

While discussing and laughing about McCain's attack ads against Obama, a coworker of mine just asked me in an exasperated tone, "When is this black-white thing gonna end? I mean aren't they tired of it. I know I am. I know we are. It's gonna have to end one day." She's a Panamanian American woman of color and identifies with being black.

Many people who wear my skin have been bouncing around the notion that we've won when Obama wins. Actually all of us regardless of complexion win, if he wins. In our community there have been just as many soft-spoken calls for cool and calm, just like Mr. Obama himself.

For the record, God-willing, should he win, the country will not devolve into the racist caricature portrayed at great length in The Birth of A Nation.

It will simply be a new day. A great day.

VOTE.

Get the Barack Obama: Latest Video widget and many other great free widgets at Widgetbox!

A race that once seemed a million miles long is now only several inches from being finished. The finish line marks the beginning of a new day where we're all poised to lunge forward into unknown waters, unknown territory, unknown everything. No matter what.

But we're not there yet. I've made a point of saying I steer clear of politics, but this is it! We're in the Endgame and I'm not sure anyone of us breathing right now will witness anything this exciting ever again in the United States of America.

Not that I'm anyone special, but I officially threw my support behind Mr. Barack Hussein Obama a few months ago and have been donating to his campaign ever since. Just in case you don't know who the man is or what his policies are then click this.

Election day is tomorrow. IF YOU ARE REGISTERED TO VOTE, THEN YOU MUST VOTE! Vote to be heard. Vote because, if you're a Black American in this country then it is likely your predecessors dreamed of you being in the very spot that you are --- a witness to history and in the position to aid in its writing. When you vote you become counted, considered, courted, listened to...the list goes on and on. The traditionally disenfranchised traditionally haven't trusted this and as a result don't vote, resulting in remaining --- disenfranchised. Up until this year, this has been the cycle that the status quo has counted on (quite successfully) again and again. This election year can be different. On the local, state and national levels. This year has to be different.

You can make it different.

VOTE!!!

The other day I read the latest GQ with Iron Man (Robert Downey, Jr.) on the cover. While reading, I happened upon an interview with Karl Rove, a very smart Bush Baddie who’s apparently reinventing himself as a television commentator. In his GQ interview he made some rather astute observations as a Republican, completely separated from this Obama-Clinton slapfest (that makes the papers at least once a week), much in the same way a mutual friend tells a husband and wife they’re both wrong.

He did however say something throughout his Q&A that stuck in my craw. He repeatedly referred to Obama as “arrogant,” and the disdain in this word leapt off the page. Is Obama thinking highly of himself? Probably, but wouldn’t any human who has experienced his current, rather stratospheric rise to the main stage (whether deserved or not)? Only someone asking for a trouncing would meekly approach the Candidacy of Office of the President of the United States. Would he be arrogant if he were Karl Rove, or George Bush or Bill Clinton? If he were Bill, he probably would.

When I hear arrogant, more than once in one sitting applied to men with skin like mine, it hearkens back to the day of the Uppity Negro --- a black man who can put a sentence together, takes care of himself, dresses well, is responsible and affable, and believes he has the same rights as everyone else in this society --- someone who has clearly lost his mind and lost his place.

I’ve experienced this in reverse. As a Cornell grad, the recipient of a Master’s Degree, someone who uses $5 words every once in a while when speaking, the owner of property, and a person who prefers introspection and reflection to uninformed, bojangle-esque reaction, I have been viewed/treated with wonderment and awe in the workplace and elsewhere as if I am a damn anomaly like Neo of the Matrix Trilogy. Yet nearly all my peers have similar if not better backgrounds that me. We don't live in caves. We don't go into hiding when the sun rises. We're mixed in with the rest of the population. It's laughable at best when it isn't frustrating.

Just because you don’t see something, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

I, in fact do believe Mr. Obama is arrogant --- arrogant or crazy to be running for President. Has he misspoken a few times on the trail? Yup. So has everyone else. I’m not giving him a pass on his errors, his voting record, experience, blah, blah, blah. But being an arrogant chief of the most arrogant empire the world has ever known is par for the course. If the gang chasing after this title were all white men, I’d bet a lot of money I don’t have to see if arrogance was even considered a point of discussion beyond the personal dislikes between candidates. Former Gov. Elliot Spitzer’s flagrant arrogance only became truly public after his house of cards collapsed on him, not before.

I could be reading more into this than I should, but there's too much to read regarding this man and that word that suggests otherwise.