Providence?

Oh, Iowa. How you've consumed me.

It happened rather quickly. Nancy and Hoyt arrived a few minutes before me to the bar in Santa Monica. One of California's blogs was joining with an organisation called Drinking Liberally to watch the returns. I came in and before I could turn my head around to count the faces, MSNBC had called it. I felt the hand on my back, clapping it. I ignored the swirling thoughts and looked up into the eyes of ascending hope. He's an elegant charm about him, I said later that night... after discussion of Alpha Girls and Vassar Boys, and an impromptu gathering of the ignorant tight-ass club of Santa Monica Liberals. Dinner on the promenade and the rush of impact on the geometry unfolding as we stood there living it - Kucinich, Biden and Dodd out, Richardson would follow suit before the end of the night.

Barack Obama.

The bump will fade, and the glory will dissipate - but for a night, as it did once before, the United States did something remarkable and good. They rejected on both ends of the ideological spectrum the triumphant imperialism, the braggadocio and insipid naiveté of our wandering time in this dessert these sixteen years.

This country is always waiting for some thing, some one - to ignite the substance of things hoped for, while all too often ignoring the evidence of things not seen. It would seem that briefly, they took up both and gathered between their teeth the reigns of an instance of providence.