It’s been an incredible experience. I’ve produced concerts and events for years and I’ve never seen anything like this. The sheer number of people was amazing. Lisa Chacon, my tour partner, and I headed out to the inauguration a little later than planned and ended up walking the entire way there from Dupont Circle. We’re both into walking, so a few miles didn’t seem like such a big deal. Watching all the people streaming to the Mall with smiles, cheers, and this incredible joy, made this long march easy. This lasted till about the time we got to the Third Street Tunnel. They had closed it off on the other end and as we got about two hundred feet in you couldn’t see clearly what was happening and there was no signage.
The tunnel just started filling with people and you could feel the anxiety levels rise as hundreds of people decided like us that being stuck in a tunnel with thousands of people wasn’t on the agenda for the day. It would have been nice to have had some people communicating to the crowd because this led to complete confusion. There are only certain streets that cross over to our destination, and after spending an hour finally getting through one check point, we were told that we had to literally go back to where we came from, because the tunnel was THE ONLY WAY to the Silver Ticket area!!!
So our very own Long March to Freedom began. After literally standing for hours neck to neck with people moving ten feet every few minutes we managed to slip into the coveted Silver Ticket area and see almost nothing.
It didn’t matter, though. What was incredible is how, through all of it, everyone maintained such grace and humor. It was all about the people.
That got me thinking about how great it is that this man, Obama, can give so many people such hope and inspire them to really know that they actually matter. People cried. They shouted and booed Bush. People held each other up, and every face I looked in, I sensed a real connection. These kind if moments are so special, so incredible to share.
It really is amazing, You feel it, this has done more to create real connection between all kinds of people than anything I’ve ever seen. Now we’ve got real work to do, and the people seem ready for it!
Tags: inauguration, jared lovejoy, lisa chacon, obama