Matthew Wayne Selznick

… I was in a 7-11 in San Clemente with Theresa, at night. We were broken up, her boyfriend was a long way away, and we hung out with each other out of familiarity and comfort. It was painful and strange but I did it anyway because I still loved her.

We were in the 7-11 to play Earthshaker, our favorite pinball game. Back then, convenience stores had arcade games, you see. It was her turn, and I looked over at the Los Angeles Times and saw this:

I remember Theresa and I were dismayed and offended by what was going on in China. I also remember looking at that picture of one desperate man holding off the storm, however temporarily, and thinking, “I get that.”

Yeah, sure. I cried.

Well, I didn’t bawl… but I wept, to be sure. My eyes leaked. My cheeks were wet. I sniffled.

See, I’m a sucker for a good story, and this is our story. For once, it had a happy ending.

Barack Obama is the President-Elect of the United States of America. First time the guy I voted for won the White House since Bill Clinton’s second term. An inspirational moment, to be sure… but why the waterworks?

Maybe it’s the situation. The national situation — there’s an undercurrent of desperation, of stagnation… of shame, maybe even. Maybe you’ve noticed? We haven’t exactly fulfilled our expectations for ourselves in quite some time, as a country. We’re poised to turn that around.

Maybe it’s my situation. Laid off. Facing taking a job for which I’m overqualified and will be underpaid to do because it will be steady work and I can’t trust my one steady freelance gig to continue to exist or be enough to pay the bills. I’m taking my second pay cut at my second job in a year and a half. Not where I thought I’d be at the end of 2008 in many ways. I need a moment of optimism, of idealism.

I’m a shameless optimist, and an idealist — if you know me at all, you know this. I also believe in justice and supporting the underdog. This often gets me in trouble. It makes me unpopular with folks who select the high road only when it doesn’t inconvenience the bottom line.

I don’t care. I feed off of hope, and tonight my entire country got a big giant bucketful.

So I shed tears for my country and for myself and for black America, too, because if I was moved… damn, African Americans must be just about unmade by joy. Did you see Jesse Jackson’s face during Obama’s victory speech? How could you not feel a tiny fraction of what he must be feeling?

This isn’t just about empathy for me, though. I take this victory personally. Barack Obama will be the first president of my generation — we’re less than six years apart in age. To the young people who were so instrumental in voting him in, he’s their father’s age, instead of their grandfather’s… or great grandfather’s. That’s important. He is of my time, my people. Barack Obama and I watched the same after-school television; came up in the same educational system (although he went a ways farther than I did.) I know this guy, at least in part.

For the first time in my life, at some level — on many levels — the president is a peer.

That’s amazing.

Now the rebuilding begins. For our country, for me… and for all of us.

When I was a kid, Cracked Magazine used to be more similar to Mad than a weird hybrid of the Onion and Details, and sometimes they included iron-on transfers in the magazine. One of those was a drawing of Arthur Fonzarelli in his classic thumbs-up pose, and it said “I’m the Fonz on his Day Off.”

I wore that shirt a lot. Hey, I was in grade school!

Recently, the actor who portrayed the Fonz on “Happy Days” took up the role again on a day off. He was joined by fellow “Happy Days” alum Ron Howard, who also revisited his first roll alongside Andy Griffith. Together, they did something fun and, yes, subtle (you have to think about it) to get out the vote for Barack Obama.