Reflections...

Election Night

By Ashley Mouldon

It was a clear evening with speckles of stars across a blackened sky. The wind blew quietly as it swirled through the massive swarms of people on downtown sidewalks and streets. Newly turned leaves rustled over shoelaces, danced among the crowds and covered the once vacant areas of Grant Park and beyond. The smell of autumn, of cigarettes and alcohol tickled the noses of people who bustled around the steel buildings and concrete pathways. Tonight was the night.

Vendors dotted street corners, holding up their prized possessions, including everything from T-shirts and buttons to baseball caps and glow-in-the-dark necklaces. Across the way, young children grasped tightly to their parents’ hands as they slid in between the herds of people. Their eyes were huge and glistening, as if they knew too that tonight would be something momentous.

Sreet musicians boomed familiar tunes of Americana, the National Anthem… Some in the crowd shook small, white maracas in unison. Some young men found a perch on a street corner perfect for making use of old buckets as drums. Into the night, hoards of people flocked to already congested areas where cheers of support and amazement rang:

"I can’t believe this is actually happening.”
“Yes we can! Yes we can! Yes we can!”
“I was here when history happened in Grant Park.”
“Obama, Obama, Obama.”
“We finally did it.”

Then the voice of the new Commander-in- Chief-elect boomed over the loud speakers as his image beamed from large screens. The crowd grew quiet as their eyes fixed upon him. It was as if they no longer could speak.

Instead they stood in silence, one collective a sea, despite their differences—come together, huddled, hoping that this election night might be the start of a new way of life for them, perhaps the spark for change and prosperity in this a time of desperation.

And it was this man, just elected the 44th president of the United States of America who was going to make it happen.