Crunchy ‘Nanas

Amidst a crazy, busy weekend, on Saturday night we headed down to Hastings to see Billy Bragg. I tried to get some pictures for Jeanne, but they all came out really crappy. (But, what do I do when photos come out crappy? I post them on Flickr anyway.  Hooray!)

The show was good. I don’t really know much of his music, except for songs Crunchy husband has popped on mixtapes for me over the years, but man, does that guy have good things to say. He is really inspiring, both in song and chit-chat between songs. I cannot get enough of “I Keep Faith” at the moment. It just reminds me of everything good that has happened lately, and how we have a more promising future ahead of us, both in what Obama can himself achieve, and in what he inspires in all of us to achieve.

In ways, Billy Bragg helped me hit on something that I’ve been having a hard time conceptualizing these past months. There is one part of my being (the very largest part) that is so optimistic and hopeful and so damn excited to see how things might play out over the next four years, at least. And then there is that voice that whispers, don’t be foolish, don’t be hasty, don’t get your hopes up. That second voice usually doesn’t win out, but it does add caution to my excitement.

But, something Billy Bragg said really resolves this conflict for me: cynicism is our greatest enemy. I know Barack Obama won’t be able to do everything everyone would like him to do.  He is only one man, working within a system, to clean up a mess that poses deep challenges. I was flipping through the group the Guardian set up on Flickr for people to post messages to Obama, and I started to feel nervous for the guy, so many hopes and dreams, so many problems to solve. It’s not realistic. But, I have faith that he will make a darn good start. It feels like in many ways, he has already done so much, inspired so many people to be involved, to care again, to take action toward a better world.

And so yeah, “and if your plans come to nothing, washed out in the rain/let me rekindle all your hopes and help you start again/I keep faith in you…”

“If you have a web site, I want to be on it…” Well, there ya go!

With Otis Gibbs

This entry was posted on Tuesday, 2nd December 2008 at  16:56 and is filed under Crunchy grooves. You can follow responses to this entry using the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.