He seems to be the only person who feels like I do. At least the only one I find in my small little internet world.  None of my friends see what he and I see. And it warms the cockles of my little heart it does.

So then. I say we’re being asked, right now, to understand that there are, in fact, two fundamental kinds of history. The first is the most common, the type we’ve grown pathetically used to, the type that soils the spirit and stabs us in the back as it takes down office towers and induces war and misprision and wallows in nearly unbearable quantities of fear. We get that a lot.

The second kind is perhaps the most rare of all. This is the history that comes around only once or twice per generation, that emerges from somewhere deep and urgent to move us forward; it’s a kind that invites growth and sparks surprisingly constructive feelings in everyone and everything it touches. Do you recognize that kind? Right. Me neither. Until now.

And now here it is, in the form of this Obama fellow, this rare and extraordinary flavor of history, this impossible thing, right on our doorstep, awaiting our vote, merely asking us if we’re ready. Are we?

Mark Morford