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| A day in history |
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| Opinion - Columns | |||
| Written by Kevin Gray | |||
| Wednesday, 21 January 2009 09:15 | |||
I remember a day from my youth, I could have been 8 or 9, and had taken the city bus to downtown Richmond, Va., with my grandmother. She didn’t drive, so the bus was our only transportation. On the return trip that day, me the color-blind – when it came to race – kid raced full-tilt to the huge, cushioned back seat. I figured it to be great for bouncing. Before I knew it, I was back “up front” with grandma. “Why can’t I sit back there?” I asked. “Because,” she said. “Cause why?” I asked. “Because the back of the bus is for the coloreds,” grandma told me under her breath. So Monday, when I heard the excitement in the voice of one Miami County resident, the day before I read the Kansas City Star headline, “At History’s Turning Point,” I thought, it’s about time. Christy Levings of rural Osawatomie called late Monday from near the Metropolitan AME Church in Washington D.C., where she had just listened to Bishop Desmond Tutu’s sermon in recognition of Dr. Martin Luther King Day and full of anticipation for the parade she would participate in for Barack Obama’s inauguration. “There are so many people here,” she said. News media had been predicting for weeks a million strong or more would show up for the swearing in of America’s first black president. Truly a sign of what is good about America. Although the sermon, according to Levings, offered a look back at Dr. King’s legacy, Tutu also offered a forward looking message, too. “He said the world wants the United States to be a leader once again. They want the United States to be an example and that hope expressed in Barack Obama’s ‘Yes We Can,’ and this is what the whole world wants to hear,” Levings said. Levings, one of six National Education Association Executive Committee members and a past president of the Kansas National Education Association, sat 30 seats from Tutu. “I had the perfect view. The service may have lasted five hours, but Dr. Tutu, as elderly and frail as he is, did quite well. His sermon actually lasted three hours. Part of this observance also included a reception and recognition of dignitaries,” she said. Forty NEA members joined Levings on the parade route yesterday. “There are six sections in the parade. We will lead the third section, and, if anyone was watching, we were right behind the Navy band, the ones carrying the NEA banner. The Fort Riley band brought up the end of our section, so it’s pretty cool to have Kansas represented that way,” she said. She said there was a very positive feeling in Washington. “The security is unbelievable, and there are military patrols, but yet, people are so excited and so many of them.” And so they should be. History is playing out before our eyes. Kansas once played an important role in doing away with slavery – called Bleeding Kansas – and so Kansas should be proud to be represented in this turning point inauguration. Only in America!
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