Current mood:

exhausted

unofficial portrait of a nation

I feel rather like someone who's just had a tumor removed that's been growing in their gut for 8 years. I keep mentally pinching myself. Is it over yet? We've heard the concession speech, the acceptance speech, the analysis by Brooks & Shields, we've dabbed our eyes a few times, we're getting used to the incessant honking and whooping from out on the street. Is it over?

I admit that I was a late-adopter when it came to Obama (my ideal candidate would've actually have been a hybrid of Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich). I was wary of the oratory, the narrative, the seeming lack of substance, the effusive media praise. But Obama steadily grew on me, and his candidacy was so preferable to that of McCain/PALIN as to be in another time zone.

So the campaign is over, the honeymoon is about to begin, followed by the period of disillusionment and eventually, the pragmatic dealing-with. Americans may soon be able to face their peers in other lands without handing out apologies and disclaimers. We may soon be dealing with just one war, not three. And oh, the novelty of a President smarter than most of us!

But for now, I just want to sleep for 8 weeks.