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| Version 2 | Version 3 |
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| Attica Locke on Obama: 'My daughter knows there's no ceiling now' | Attica Locke on Obama: 'My daughter knows there's no ceiling now' |
| (12 days later) | |
| Los Angeles novelist Attica Locke, 37, was shortlisted for the Orange prize for Black Water Rising, and has just published her second book, The Cutting Season | Los Angeles novelist Attica Locke, 37, was shortlisted for the Orange prize for Black Water Rising, and has just published her second book, The Cutting Season |
| In the summer of 2008, when it became really clear to me that Obama was going to be the nominee of the Democratic party and that this man was actually very likely to be president of our country, I started having panic attacks. I felt a tremendous free-floating anxiety about what we were all about to walk into. It felt that if this happened we were all going to wake up in a new country on the day after the election. We were entering into the unknown. | In the summer of 2008, when it became really clear to me that Obama was going to be the nominee of the Democratic party and that this man was actually very likely to be president of our country, I started having panic attacks. I felt a tremendous free-floating anxiety about what we were all about to walk into. It felt that if this happened we were all going to wake up in a new country on the day after the election. We were entering into the unknown. |
| There was tremendous excitement, clearly, but also a realisation that there was a certain way that I had looked at what it meant to be black in America my whole life, a certain way I talked about it with relatives, parents and grandparents that was about to be permanently altered, and, alongside the joy, that was unnerving and uncomfortable. I was about to step outside of a familiar script about race in America. I was ready to take the ride but I will admit that it felt that big to me. | There was tremendous excitement, clearly, but also a realisation that there was a certain way that I had looked at what it meant to be black in America my whole life, a certain way I talked about it with relatives, parents and grandparents that was about to be permanently altered, and, alongside the joy, that was unnerving and uncomfortable. I was about to step outside of a familiar script about race in America. I was ready to take the ride but I will admit that it felt that big to me. |
| Since then it has been impossible for me to think of his presidency without seeing him through the eyes of my daughter. She will be six next month and she has no concept that there has ever been another president besides Barack Obama. She came into a world where there was no ceiling on the possibility for blackness. There is no way for me to articulate the profound shift that represents from the way I was raised, the way my parents were raised and the way my grandparents were raised. She really is in a different country. | Since then it has been impossible for me to think of his presidency without seeing him through the eyes of my daughter. She will be six next month and she has no concept that there has ever been another president besides Barack Obama. She came into a world where there was no ceiling on the possibility for blackness. There is no way for me to articulate the profound shift that represents from the way I was raised, the way my parents were raised and the way my grandparents were raised. She really is in a different country. |
| Until a couple of months before the election I thought I would never see it in my lifetime. On election night my sister had a family gathering – we just stood, staring at the television. I kept looking at her and saying, "Is this real? Is this actually happening?" It blew me away. I probably will love Barack and Michelle Obama for the rest of my life, and I love them from a place that is beyond policy. I love the fact that they had the courage to stand up and walk this journey for the rest of us because it has not been pretty and it has stirred up a lot of vitriol. They put their family on the line so that we as a country could take a leap forward. | Until a couple of months before the election I thought I would never see it in my lifetime. On election night my sister had a family gathering – we just stood, staring at the television. I kept looking at her and saying, "Is this real? Is this actually happening?" It blew me away. I probably will love Barack and Michelle Obama for the rest of my life, and I love them from a place that is beyond policy. I love the fact that they had the courage to stand up and walk this journey for the rest of us because it has not been pretty and it has stirred up a lot of vitriol. They put their family on the line so that we as a country could take a leap forward. |
| I see the last four years as the first step towards real, fundamental change in America. The mere fact that he got voted in is a sign that America has already changed. If you want an example of how much, look at same-sex marriage. The swell towards complete acceptance of that is in my view moving even faster than acceptance of racial equality. | I see the last four years as the first step towards real, fundamental change in America. The mere fact that he got voted in is a sign that America has already changed. If you want an example of how much, look at same-sex marriage. The swell towards complete acceptance of that is in my view moving even faster than acceptance of racial equality. |
| What we do with all this from here remains to be seen, because certainly beyond Obama's perch in the White House there is still tremendous inequality, economic and racial. But his presidency has opened a door, and it is up to us whether we walk through it and reach towards the best of ourselves. One thing is certain: I would be raising my child in a different way if he were not president. He's made my job easier, simply by virtue of the position that he holds in her mind. He holds the highest office in the land and he looks like her. That's all that needs to happen for her to feel that everything is available to her. | What we do with all this from here remains to be seen, because certainly beyond Obama's perch in the White House there is still tremendous inequality, economic and racial. But his presidency has opened a door, and it is up to us whether we walk through it and reach towards the best of ourselves. One thing is certain: I would be raising my child in a different way if he were not president. He's made my job easier, simply by virtue of the position that he holds in her mind. He holds the highest office in the land and he looks like her. That's all that needs to happen for her to feel that everything is available to her. |
| The other thing that is all too clear to me is that it could all take a very wrong turn on 6 November. What really now matters is that people go and vote. People need to find the excitement of four years ago again and show up at the polls. | The other thing that is all too clear to me is that it could all take a very wrong turn on 6 November. What really now matters is that people go and vote. People need to find the excitement of four years ago again and show up at the polls. |
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