Note: After an election this historic, I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t write something about it, but for the love of God, let’s not fight if we disagree. We’ve been fighting for two years. I’m not a wild-eyed advocate of anyone or anything. This is the most thoughtful interpretation of my conflicting feelings that I can compose. Sometimes blog entries are written as much for the blogger as the reader, and honest to God, I don’t want to pick a fight with anyone. I’m just chewing my cud.

————

For as hard as I found it to blog on election day, in some ways it’s even harder to know what to write on the day after. Not because I don’t have feelings and opinions, but because everyone is still so emotionally charged. Earlier I tweeted that it’s time to take a breath, remember that things always work out, and to come back together as friends and neighbors. I texted a friend this morning and said, “See, the sun did come up today.”

Last evening, in speaking with another chum on the phone, we discussed the well-entrenched conservatism of the land from which we sprang. It’s hard, even as middle-aged women, to admit to thinking outside of that box or to encourage those younger than ourselves to do so even if we can’t. But how I love that land and those people! There is no place on earth where I feel more secure than West Texas. A more bull-headed people do not exist, but by the same token, it’s hard to find folk more honest, loyal and dependable.

There are days, here in this city, when I yearn for that land with all my heart. It’s a home sickness that never quite goes away and a feeling that exists apart from any political sentiment or difference of opinion. The Little Town and Little Town people have, through the years, often frustrated me, but I can no more live without that foundation than I could exist without blood in my veins. We are, after all, a pack of transplanted southerners with the love of the land and the clan encoded in our genes.

Last night, without even thinking, I remarked that McCain carried the Confederacy.

“The Confederacy?” said my Yankee housemate with a knowing smile.

“Yes, by God, the Confederacy,” I said, grinning back. It hasn’t quite been 150 years, give us time, we might get over it in another hundred or so.

So, you might think from what I’ve said so far, that I’m upset about last night. Nothing could be farther from the truth. To say that I’m proud of my country implies I haven’t been proud before and we need to clear that up right away. Anyone who has watched me go instantly to tears when a bugle blows Taps or openly weep when they post the colors at the rodeo will not question the depth of my soppy patriotism. I can grit my teeth and get through damn near anything dry-eyed, but not love of country.

I am of that conflicted generation of southerners, however, conservative on so many topics, moderate to liberal on others, constantly struggling with the pull of the past and my roots and that of my education and the future. I have my distinctly redneck elements that coexist with those ideas that have, on occasion, led my Mother to pronounce that my years in college and graduate school “ruined me.”

So when I say I’m proud of this country for electing Barak Obama, it’s not because of race, but of principle. We overcame traditional thinking, dared to go outside of the box, and choose a man with a funny name and forward looking ideas who also happens to be African-American. Were we right? Ask me in four years. Was it time? I can answer that right now. Yes.

But concurrently, I feel the anger and fear of my fellow red-state Texans. We’re not good with change down here. If great-grand-daddy didn’t do it that way, it’s a little suspect. I’ve had friends announce they were going to go out and buy a couple of guns for fear they won’t be able to get them for awhile. Well, go ahead, there’s always a good reason to put a new gun in the cabinet. I love a fine rifle or pistol as much as any self-respecting West Texas woman.

My best suggestion, however, would be to drink a cold one tonight, cuss as much as makes you feel good, and then get on back to work. We bitch a lot, but I’ve never known a Texan who wouldn’t step up for his country regardless of who is in the White House. It’s fine to be mouthy about it and even finer to keep the government honest by watching and questioning every step it takes. We haven’t really liked a politician down here since General Sam and you know it.

But has the world come to an end? Of course not. The sun came right on up this morning and it will tomorrow. Is the world a little changed? Yes and I feel in my heart, it’s for the better. I don’t live in the world my folks lived in at 45 and today’s children won’t live in a world like mine. I hope I’ll be one of those 100-year old voters in 2072 making sage pronouncements about all the elections I’ve seen and all the ways we’ve grown.

What happened last night would not have been possible in 1962 when I was born. I frankly didn’t expect to live long enough to see it. A few years ago I probably wouldn’t have thought it all turned out well. The point is change is growth. The converse of growth is stagnation. I don’t think we can afford that anymore. Let’s give this fellow a chance. That’s fair, isn’t it? And you know as well as I do that if he doesn’t do a good job, he’s going to be held to account for it, because that’s how the system works in these parts. And in the end, flaws and all, it’s a good system that proved itself last night.