...Today.

~~I haven't done anything for a while. I did eventually make some decorations with my niece, and I did eventually make those speakers. But I've only done two things since then: I got a new ID and I voted.

And we won.

In light of that, I have participated in grand symposiums. One such dissertation was initiated by an enthused Swedish woman named Emma, thrilled by the events that have taken place over the last 24 hours in America, and by association, the world.

I present my response to her unabashed gaiety, and I once again borrow from my favorite philosophers.

The best day to be is today...

Emma, there's a reason martyrdom is such a strong force. After the Bush administration, many things became martyrs: civil freedoms, the ambition for a united and peaceful future, the impression that the United States of America represented the best and brightest that the world has to offer. Whereas history represents martyrs as personalities, the modern generation's martyrs are represented as ideals. And ironically, the same ideals that have become victims now are the very same ideals that built this country and all it stood for.

The ingeniousness of those original ideals being that this country was drafted in the present, but blueprinted to forever be the nation of the future. It has come full circle many times; through the civil war, two world wars, the 1960s, and now the beginning of the 21st century. It's a cycle that the country is destined to repeat forever. We must always be reminded why it is that we came to be. And that is why our nation's greatest strength is a result of our greatest weaknesses. No matter what happens, no matter how hard the fight, no matter how long it takes, right is might. Just as it was in the past, it is now. It is the attacks that have been and will be endured that steels our purpose. What doesn't kill the search makes it stronger. What tries to kill that search makes it invincible.

It is in that way that we can be thankful for the past eight years. It is in that way that we can be thankful for the economic crisis. And it is in that way that we can be thankful for the struggles the world met on and since September 11th. Only with the odds so stacked against us have we been able to realize just how powerful we all are. Only through the sacrifices that have been and are yet to be made--those willing and unwilling--can the true force be realized in the search for what is rightful and good.

Today merely represents the inevitable result of the constant, progressive march towards social equality and equanimity. We are more civilized a people today than the world has ever known. But this is not the apex of our species, and the cycle will continue. As the architects of the United States knew inherently, only by the actions we take now can we predict what is yet to come. And in that respect, today is the only day, and old times make way for the new.