A stomach’s eye view of inauguration

August 20, 2009 | Observer Staff | Comments 0

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Musings on the events, crowds and food of inauguration weekend

By Kevin Cross

The 2009 Inauguration of Barack Obama was supposed to be an extraordinary event. Meaning should have suffused everything, the weather, Lincoln’s Bible, the colors of scarves and ties, Vice President Cheney’s wheelchair, the collapse of Senators Byrd and Kennedy.

Only a transcendent context could move the Smithsonian to seek Aretha Franklin’s great gray winged dog bowl of a hat as an item of historical note, and not merely a testament to the art of steam-punk haberdashery.

But the thing we were all supposed to have palpitations over was not the hat. No, it was quite simple, the man swearing the oath of Presidency was a son of Africa.

This was, no doubt, a huge deal.I knew the import of the moment. I voted for Obama. I’m from Illinois and met him at a constituency meeting two years ago. I read and loved Dreams from My Father. I ran in the streets when he won, and I misted up—OK, wept like grass on a dewy morn—during his acceptance speech in Grant Park.

Why was it then, that during Inauguration I didn’t feel much? Why didn’t I feel as if I were swimming in the river of history?

It could be, I suppose, that I have an appreciation for free food and drink. To be blunt, I’m a glutton. Instead of huddling around the jumbotrons on the frigid Mall with the masses, searching for the significance of it all, I was swimming in the great gravy bowl of DC largesse.

At Rosa Mexicana on Martin Luther King Day I spent a good three hours thrusting various corn-based products into a stone vat of freshly pummeled avocados. There were also shrimp skewers, pigs in blankets, and cheesecake bites. I had my first pomegranate margarita, delicious and packed with antioxidants. I believe I am set, as far as antioxidants go, for quite some time.

Later that night, at an Obama booster’s home in Dupont I had my first ever bacon-wrapped scallops. This little dish is, in my opinion, the nonpareil of non-Kosher, all-protein, surf ‘n turf, culinary duets.

At yet another event I had crab cakes, prosciutto, a lovely cheese platter and wine with a seven foot Greek communist. We shared an admiration for the kalamata olives and bruschetta. He suggested between mouthfuls that Obama did not represent the interests of the proletariat, or something like that. I wasn’t really listening, and his mouth was full of food.

The next morning I couldn’t bring myself and my distended gut to get up early enough to get a spot on the Mall. So I accepted an invitation to watch the inauguration in a corporate boardroom of extraordinary comfort and style.

We sat in red leather chairs and watched coverage from three channels on three large flat-screen TV’s. Though the office was only four blocks from the Capital, I couldn’t see the Mall itself. I could, I think, hear the crowd’s roar through the office windows.

The event was catered. I missed Rick Warren’s benediction due to the arrival of a sublime salmon pâté, which went well on everything: bread, crackers, toast, bagels, muffins, biscuits, buns, ham, and pieces of smoked salmon (something I call “death by salmon”).

Eva, my companion by the salmon pâté bowl and an African American consultant from Upper Marlboro said, “Never thought I’d see this in my lifetime.” She was in her fifties, and had grown up in Georgia. She said she’d been denied food at restaurants even through the 1970s.

Here we were now, sharing a sublime salmon pâté. I told her that I’d never had such sublime salmon, and was glad there was plenty of it so we didn’t have to cross crackers.

By the time Obama was given a chance to talk, I was quite stuffed and ready for a rousing speech. I expected soaring imagery and memorable phrases, the kind of triumphant “yes we can” homiletic that made me want to swing from light posts on election night. I wanted to be moved.

I was disappointed. The President sounded like a manager at a grocery store where I worked in high school, standing disapprovingly before us in the break room, exhorting us to punch our time cards correctly and make sure to put little bags around leaky chicken so as to prevent it from leaking on the cash register. “For everywhere we look,” he said, “there is work to be done.”

When it was done I grabbed my jacket, took a few salmon-smeared crackers for the trip back, and headed home. Around me were the people who’d been on the mall. I could feel how cold they were, and how much they’d gone through. Because there were no cars the city seemed eerily silent.

I finished off the last of the crackers. Tomorrow, a return to classes. No more salmon pâté or bacon wrapped scallops. It set in: there is work to be done.

Kevin Cross is a first year M.A. candidate in Middle East Studies.

Filed Under: February 2009