photo by Callie Shell
Last October, I talked about a photo essay by Callie Shell that I really enjoyed, chronicling the Obama campaign. Well, she’s done it again. TIME magazine has just published Shell’s series of photos of President Obama’s first 100 days in office.
Here’s the thing: these are good photos, but they are not telling a hugely emotional story. They show the President and his people mostly at work, occasionally at rest. And yet, looking through them made me cry. Good cry or bad cry? Nicola asked when I told her. This was good cry, definitely.
I spent eight years believing to my core that there was not a single human being in the White House who was interested in understanding who I am and what I might need (not even as a citizen, never mind as one human being to another). I felt completely invisible to my government, except in all the let-me-monitor-your-email ways. And that was fine: I didn’t want to come to the attention of those folks, because no good ever came of that for most of us.
But I look at these photos, and I don’t feel that way now. I feel like smart people are working long hours to do their best for me. For me. I feel like it would be a pleasure and a privilege to sit with these people at dinner and talk about life, love, art, science, history, the beauty of the world and the people in it. I just like them, you know?
And I think this makes me cry because I had given up hope of ever feeling this way about government of any kind, ever again. The City of Seattle and the State of Washington take pretty good care of me; but suddenly, unexpectedly, I feel closer to these strangers in D.C. than I do to people running things in my own back yard. And it feels good.
(If you’re interested in an overview of the key events of the first 100 days, TIME also offers this very cool interactive guide.)