Dr Martin Luther King Jr, President Barack Obama, and the Little Man

I have been really pleased with the way the Little Man's teacher has approached the entire presidential process - the election and the inauguration both. Back in October he came home talking about who he would vote for if he was able and the conversations have yet to cease in the past 4 months.

Yesterday they watched the inauguration in class. I did not know about it ahead of time so I was very pleased when he came home talking about it last night. He took a lot out of it and seemed to catch every little detail. (He even talked about the flubbed Oath - "He should have told him the words in chunks, you can't remember lots of words.") I sent an email to his teacher yesterday thanking her for allowing him that piece of history. Is it something he'll remember as an adult? Not necessarily, but maybe.

Yesterday I actually had someone tell me that they didn't see what the big deal was, why everyone was making such a fuss about THIS inauguration as opposed to others. I was in disbelief that she couldn't grasp the significance of what we were witnessing. I, on the other hand, fought back tears watching the CNN coverage online after I got home last night. This is history unfolding right in front of our eyes, it's powerful and inspiring, and I'm glad that it has finally happened.

Tonight the Little Man was full of questions and observations. It started with him telling me that Barack Obama was in a bullet proof 'cage' and that even his limosine was bullet proof. Obviously they had shared in some deep conversations at school for this to be brought up, and this isn't new for any president - they all go through those great lengths for protection. I asked him why that was, why did he need the bullet proof 'cage' and car. His answer was not as simple as I would have hoped. "Because his skin is brown, but Mom, why does that matter?".

We talked a lot tonight. Probably the heaviest conversation, definitely the most grown up, that we've ever had. We talked about what it meant to be president and what an important job that is. We talked about people not always liking the job that a president does or decisions that they make causing the need for the bullet proof glass. We talked about the color of our skin, and that of our friends. We talked about how some people think that the color of your skin decides what kind of person you are and that you don't deserve certain rights because of that color. He told me, almost puzzled, that he did not understand because he has friends with brown skin - and they are all just like him. At 6 years old, he knows what some adults can not even figure out - the color of your skin does not matter, it does not make you who you are.

The Little Man told me he had read a book last year about Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and in it there was a picture of him helping a group of children. He told me about how MLK is important because he was helping the black people so that they could do anything they want.

The last thing that he told me before he went to bed tonight was that when he grows up - he wants to help people like Martin Luther King Jr did, and...he thinks he'd like to be President.

Little Man....Here's to your Dream.