This is the tale of the magical time I got to see and hear Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama speaking and laughing and breathing and living life in the same room as myself.
The day was Tuesday, July 25. The place was Denver, Colorado. The event was a fancy-schmancy gala celebrating the 30th anniversary of the Women's Foundation of Colorado (WFCO). Although, it was held at the Pepsi Center (home stadium for the Denver Nuggets), so it wasn't that fancy.
My dear friend Emily works for Junior Achievement, and her boss is a member of WFCO and therefore had access to event tickets. Emily was invited to go and, thoughtful and generous like-minded person that she is, got me a ticket too as a birthday gift.
The thing started at 5:30 p.m., but we were in Denver by 2:45 due to sheer excitement, so we frittered away the rest of the afternoon eating sushi burritos (did you know that was a thing? So good) and walking around downtown, letting the walk signs at crosswalks dictate the path we took. Eventually we met up with the other Junior Achievement ladies and joined the parade of well-dressed women taking the Pepsi Center by storm. A few men too, but honestly who cares about them. At a time like that, I am all about the sisterhood.
The event started off with a plethora of speakers and presentations that were clearly intended to highlight the work of WFCO and inspire donations, but primarily served to intensify everyone's anxious excitement that was building up in anticipation of seeing our beloved lady.
During those introductory presentations, though, I did learn that this was Michelle's first public appearance since leaving the White House.
This was the first time that our lady Michelle has given any kind of public address in six months and she chose to spend it in Colorado. With us.
#RockyMountainLuck
Finally the big moment came, charmingly introduced by a group teenage girls participating in WFCO programs who each gave a few sentences of introduction in a different language: Arabic, Amharic, Mandarin, American Sign Language, Spanish, and more.
The opening of Demi Lovato's What's Wrong With Being Confident played over the speakers. Michelle walked out. All 8,500 of us jumped up to our feet. I started crying immediately. We cheered and waved and clapped and radiated energy for a long time. Eventually we sat down but the energy stayed.
Rather than a prepared speech, this was set up as a Q&A with Lauren Young Casteel, president and CEO of the Women's Foundation of Colorado and also a black woman. Though I love Michelle's prepared speeches something fierce, this was better. Everything she said was unrehearsed, and that made it feel so much more real, even conversational, despite the size of the room and the crowd.
No pictures or recording were allowed during Michelle's portion of the night, but you can see a few photos in this article:
http://www.denverpost.com/2017/07/25/michelle-obama-speech-womens-foundation-of-colorado-30th-anniversary-denver/
I didn't have many well-formed hopes or expectations going in, but whatever I did have was exceeded. I was profoundly touched by Michelle's wisdom, encouragement, and strength, which were evident not just in her words but beneath them too.
She openly discussed racism. (That's a big deal, as it's something the two Obamas really didn't do while in the White House. They've received some criticism for not doing so, but in my opinion, that silence is both a symptom and a cause of the current problem.) She named women's resilience and women's strength. She made us laugh. She made us all feel like friends. She soothed our weary souls, already battered from the past six/eight/twelve months.
Perhaps the most thought-provoking line of hers was, "We have to stop giving our power away." I'm still turning that over and over as I go through my days, and I have to say, I've found far too many examples already of women giving away our power. Think about it: Mommy Wars. Victim blaming. Silence. Workplace cultures.
At one point, Lauren quoted a friend of hers who recently said, "Nobody tells you that when you're breaking through the glass ceiling, the shards that fall on you are excruciating." A breath went through the room as we all absorbed this. I'm still turning that one over too.
I could go on, but mostly I want more spaces and more conversations like this. My rambling doesn't truly capture the way that night felt; we have to replicate it ourselves. A blog post isn't a good medium for two-way exchange, but I genuinely hope to have more conversation about this. Talk to me in person, or talk to your friends and sisters and communities. Keep creating those moments when we can be really honest about navigating life as women. Because as I'm coming to understand more and more, we aren't just hurt by our own experiences of trauma -- we are deeply wounded by the traumas of others. Part of being a woman is living with little tiny cuts day after day from the shards that fell on our sisters, that are still falling today.
Take care of yourself today, sisters, and know that wherever you are, Michelle Obama is fighting for you. And I am, too.
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