Brush with Barack

Mid-Term Madness has been sweeping the nation. This time tomorrow the Democratic Party may have regained control of the House and/or Senate. Today candidates across the country were pulling out all the stops to secure votes. For Democratic candidates here in Illinois that meant having political superstar Barack Obama stump for you. Being the good Democrat that I am I made my way to the College of Lake County campus late this morning to attend a rally in support of our Congresswoman. Okay, who am I kidding; I went to see Barack Obama. And I wasn't disappointed.

Barack Obama is larger than life! Everything you see on television, the charisma, the intelligence, the genuineness, all of it, magnify it by 100 and just maybe you can imagine what the man is like in real life.

I was able to meet him, shake his hand, and briefly talk to him. Although he was being bombarded in every direction like a rock star our minute long conversation was just that a conversation. We spoke about education and the need to reform No Child Left Behind. When I told him that I had been laid off by two different school districts as a result of NCLB he looked me in the eye, shook my hand and apologized. "Noel I am so sorry, that's not right, we need to keep our teachers in our schools" were his exact words. I didn't know what to say, I was momentarily speechless. I hadn't received this much empathy from my principals when they delivered the bad news. But here I was face to face with a man who could one day be our President. Right then and there he gave me the audacity of hope.