The only Presidential Inauguration I’ve ever attended, and likely the only one I ever will, was Barack Obama’s first, back in 2009. Money was tight for my wife and me then, but we managed to scrape together funds from my mother’s life insurance – she had passed away from lung cancer just six weeks prior to the election. We bundled up our young children, ages five and three, in layers upon layers of warm clothes, hats pulled low, and packed thermoses of soup and hot chocolate, enough hand warmers to share, preparing as if for an Arctic expedition. The Washington D.C. air was bitingly cold, hovering in the twenties, and we stood outside for what felt like an eternity – eight hours. It probably should have been miserable. Our kids likely endured some discomfort. My wife and I must have had our share of parental disagreements that day. But that’s not how I recall it. My memories are filled with laughter, the warmth of holding gloved hands, the rotation of carrying our children on our shoulders, and our son proudly waving a flag adorned with the faces of Michelle and Barack Obama. I vividly remember the Metro car, packed shoulder to shoulder with strangers, erupting in spontaneous, heartfelt renditions of “We Shall Overcome.”
That day, we were buoyed by hope. But that hope was born from the shadow of the terror, the deep anguish, and the constant frustration that had been our daily reality. We were living in a country that had, for centuries, systematically oppressed a significant portion of its own people, and then blamed those very people for striving to reclaim their basic human dignity. To be Black in America is to navigate a relentless, overwhelming assault on the senses, a daily struggle against spiritual and intellectual erasure.
Growing up, much of my childhood was spent in a predominantly white, small town nestled in Appalachia, within the Rust Belt. By the time I reached seventh grade, my days were marked by confrontations with classmates who hurled racial slurs, and my nights were haunted by secret wishes to be white, to escape the burden of being hated. The message was clear and early: blackness was inherently negative, a characteristic that provoked hatred and anger in others. When I was twelve, a white man driving past me on the street threw a milkshake, hitting me as I rode my skateboard. I learned a harsh lesson: being Black was so offensive it could incite random acts of aggression from adults against children. It felt as though I carried some kind of contagious disease that made people want to inflict pain.
This upbringing instilled in me a deep-seated fear of racists. Even within the supposed safety of my home, there was an unspoken awareness that just beyond the threshold lurked menacing figures, fueled by hate and eager to witness my suffering. When white friends spoke excitedly of road trips, I invented excuses to stay behind. When conversations turned to race, I would fall silent, waiting for the topic to shift. This, of course, is precisely how racism functions: it’s a calculated form of terrorism and mind control, designed to force you into submission, to instill fear and prevent you from asserting your own humanity.
Attending Obama’s Inauguration, we were intoxicated by the possibility that this long nightmare might finally be ending. We had always, to some degree, trusted our government to shield us from external threats. Now, there was a burgeoning hope that it might also protect us from internal ones, from the insidious threat of domestic racism.
However, we then witnessed Obama, in the early days of his administration, cautiously navigating the treacherous terrain of race relations, each step seeming to draw blood. After the incident where Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. was arrested at his own home, Obama’s initial comments criticizing the Cambridge police led to a noticeable dip in his approval ratings, particularly among white voters. This would not be the last instance where he seemed to misjudge the volatile sensitivities of white America surrounding issues of race. For eight years, we watched him attempt to thread an impossible needle, searching for a unifying message that could resonate across a nation that appeared to be increasingly divided. The tragic deaths of Trayvon Martin, Eric Garner, John Crawford, Tamir Rice, Rekia Boyd, Sandra Bland, and too many others ignited a powerful protest movement. Soon, the assertion that Black lives mattered was controversially labeled by some as a terrorist threat; discussions of race wars, previously relegated to the fringes, crept into the mainstream of American discourse.
The Obama years, paradoxically, seemed to fuel anger, defensiveness, and fear in many segments of American society. The ascent of Donald Trump, built on a platform of fear-mongering about external and internal threats, stands as a stark example of this. But for me, those eight years had a profoundly different, almost opposite effect. I was far more fearful before Obama’s presidency. The sheer joy I felt at his Inauguration was only possible because white racism had been a source of terror for decades, and I had placed hope in Obama to be a kind of shield, a protector.
He could not be that, of course. America’s deeply rooted racial illness is far larger and more complex than any single individual. Nonetheless, his presidency yielded an unexpected and transformative effect on me: it fundamentally altered my understanding of racism itself. Obama was, by any objective measure, an exceptional president and politician: deeply knowledgeable, meticulously prepared, intellectually sharp, and remarkably honest. He approached the office with the gravity and seriousness it demanded. While I didn’t agree with all of his policy decisions, I was convinced that he made them with integrity, driven by a genuine belief that they would serve the greater good for the majority of people.
And yet, despite his undeniable qualifications and dedication, he was subjected to relentless name-calling and branded a failure by his political opposition. His very citizenship and religious beliefs were questioned and attacked. Republicans in Congress seemed willing to push the country to the brink of economic disaster rather than appear to cooperate with him. News commentators openly questioned his competence for the job. These reactions, in their sheer absurdity and vehemence, moved beyond the realm of mere terror and into something almost cartoonish. White racism, which I had always perceived as a terrifying, potent force, increasingly began to appear to me as something childish, pathetic, and ultimately, less powerful than I had believed.
Meanwhile, Barack and Michelle Obama – with their composure, their unwavering commitment to each other, and their evident grace – served as a powerful reflection of my own potential. Representation, it turns out, truly does matter. Growing up isolated among white peers, I often questioned whether I possessed any inherent worth or inner beauty. Seeing Michelle and Barack in the White House, I knew that I did.
Even now, I am not naive. I still grapple with thoughts of potential dangers and future calamities. But I am no longer paralyzed by fear. I possess a clear understanding of my own inherent value, and the inherent value of every individual. I no longer harbor the hope of somehow avoiding or appeasing the demons of racism – I recognize that asserting my own humanity will inevitably provoke a reaction. And there is no political scenario, under any president or administration, in which I would ever choose to suppress that assertion. I have a family I love, and a deeply ingrained sense of right and wrong to guide me.
When Barack Obama initially campaigned for president, his message was centered on hope. But hope, I’ve come to realize, is primarily the domain of the fearful. The true Parting Gift of his presidency, the lasting legacy he unknowingly bestowed upon me, was not hope, but something far more durable and empowering: a profound sense of personal power. It was the realization that the fear I had carried for so long was a construct, and that my own worth was not contingent on the acceptance or approval of others, but was inherent and undeniable. This unexpected parting gift, this shift from fear to personal power, is what truly endures from the Obama era.
