Becoming, by Michelle LaVaughn Robinson Obama

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A lot of the time, I lay awake in the middle of the night thinking.

Overthinking really.

Everyone else in the house will be asleep, occupied with their own dreams. My own thoughts keeping me company. The light in the hallway would pool into the doorway of my bedroom, though it stayed languid. Eventually I would fall asleep but only for a couple hours until it’s early into the morning. I’d say around four, or even six am at the very least. I don’t exactly understand why my body does this, nor if my current age and sleeping times are the exact cause of this consuetude. I would usually go back to sleep and wake up much later into the day. Cause’ the odds of me waking up early is very low.

The gaps between me and sleep are usually filled with peculiar thoughts about the future, my art, or something completely out of the ordinary and just weird as heck. I mean, what do you except from a girl who is half asleep, completely alone, and thinks senselessly way too much. Let alone a girl who is me. Sure, I end up pondering a lot of things all at once. But one thought always stays in the back of my mind, surfacing at miscellaneous moments that usually lead to a longer endeavor of thought. And those thoughts circulate around each other like a swarm of mosquitoes or wasps. And that is;

One’s past life.

*dunH duNH DUNH

(O . o)

SO SPOOKY.

Reincarnation was a process I came to truly learn last year. After reading various books in which my history teacher supplied due to our lessons mostly rotating around the history and philosophy of Buddhism, at the time.

According to various texts, reincarnation or rebirth is the philosophy in which a living being, after death, takes on a new form, in a new life. Their physical body itself can take on the form of any living animate object. For example a human being, or a creature of the wild.

I feel that reincarnation has a direct connection to the doctrine of past lives; thought same may disagree that it’s an outlandish reverie based of off convictional metaphysics. Some may fancy the idea of having lived multiple lives under different personas in times before their current state.

Me, well. I guess I’m a little bit of both. I like hard-core facts, scientific reasoning, you know to make it all the more true. But I also relish some good mythology and allegorical stories. And what do you get when you put the two together?

YOU GET BAM.

A MESS.

YEAH.

The theory of past lives are sought out by many people seeking different explanations. But if you think about it, the philosophy behind rebirth takes a different turn on everyone. Depending on who you talk to, these can be based of religion, or just good ol’ belief.

For a while, ever since it had been released I’d been wanting to get the book Becoming, a memoir written by Michelle Obama and originally published in November. And while going through the book, I thought back to my night time pondering and the little past lives shebang. Reading about the life of Michelle Obama, it felt like she was living multiple different lives. But as the same person, though her soul was evolving just as her body. She was the same person going through completely different scenarios she never dreamed she would go through. A more mental form of bodily revival, rather than the said theory of reincarnation.

The main reason why I wanted this book was because she’s such an inspiration to all women out there. A fighter at heart with a burning fire and encouraging us females to never, ever, let ours die out. In my mind, she is one of the countless women who has revolutionized the way we see our own dreams and goals. I’ve read one or two of her husband’s books before, and plenty of books circulating around his eight years in office. As commander in chief, and so on. But it’s even better to read from the perspective of the person who is experiencing everything her husband does. But feeling emotions you won’t be able to read when they take the podium and give a speech, emotions you won’t be able to feel even when you’re watching them live. Just like millions of other people in the country.

Writing and books are probably the closest thing to magic we’ll ever have. Each one can hold and entire universe so unlike your own, and yet still be right at your fingertips. Books can give you an intimate tour of someone else’s life itself. So instead of standing up in front of a bunch of cameras and mikes, and a teleprompter in their face; people can just sit down at home and write their entire life story as a narrative for the world.

This era of women have broken down barriers that were held against them because of  gender, and or by race(s). And in my opinion, these are only a handful of thousands out there who did just that.

Michelle  O b a m a

Emma  W a t s o n

Amanda  L o v e l a c e

Maya  A n g e l o u

Ellen  D e G e n e r e s

Lupita  N y o n g ‘ o

Malala  Y o u s a f z a i

Oprah  W i n f r e y

J.K.  R o w l i n g

Alexandria  O c a s i o-C o r t e z

And can we just take a second to just appreciate the absolute brilliance of all of these women? And not only women; just human beings in general. I mean teachers, scientists, firefighters, policemen, men and women serving in the army. And just the people who have been so crucial in building the foundations of not only this nation, but all around the world.

Now here’s a little background on how I actually got my hands on a copy of Becoming. Or rather, how the book managed to find it’s way towards yours truly(aka ME).

My parents got me a copy for Christmas.

It was really simple, not a complicated affair of course. My parents have just accepted the fact that I would take a book over anything. Including food and basic hydration. Courtesy to the stack of books that always end up in my grasp at the dinner table. And then a thorough scolding afterwards. If you don’t believe me just picture me hiding out in my bedroom cuddling in a bundle on my couch near the window and reading with no other light except for a simple lamp to my right side. A steaming mug of tea and earbuds in my ears with music washing over me through my phone. Sketchbook always beside me in the constant scenario in which an idea will spark from my brain to my hands. Happens everyday and takes up the gap of time between almost every meal or homework session.

*Cue another meticulous scolding from my parents.

It’s quite hilarious after a while and even my parents get a good laugh out of it.

Anyway, Christmas morning, I woke up to the sounds of my little brother bounding from his bedroom to mine and whispering with a light in his eyes;

“Akka, iiiiiiiiiiiitssssssss Chrisssssssssssttttttmmaaaaas.”

I swear I would’ve been convinced my kid brother was a snake whisperer if I hadn’t fully opened my eyes and stumbled out of bed; just in time to see him leap military style into my parent’s room and proceed to clamber on top of them in his ecstatic state of happiness. Letting the same message he delivered vocally to me and then to my parents. Which led to a series of irritated groans and choking sounds from my dad. And a tired nod and smile from my mom.

The whole process to get my parents up and out of bed on Christmas morning is something that all of us kids dreaded. Nice to see gifts under a decked out tree with my name on them. Everyone’s happy and candy everywhere! Who wouldn’t be absolutely ecstatic to see that!?

Well my parents apparently!

(It took at least a half hour to get them up and out of bed, which is less than what it usually takes mind you.)

Anyway, I got various presents that I liked, but one of my favorites was definitely the brand new hardcover copy of Becoming. With a nice baby blue background and Michelle Obama beaming in the cover. As my siblings opened the rest of their presents, I started pouring of the pages of the book and refused to put the book down for a few days afterwards.

Michelle Obama didn’t want to just be the wife of a politician with a large title. Always smiling, living a life that gave her a direct title right above her head. No, she had plans of her own that she wanted to set forth. To get her own podium and stand on it. Say what’s on  her mind and let it set forth.

If the possibility of her husband becoming president was close of course. Michelle Obama revolutionized the persona of the FLOTUS(First Lady of the United States) role. She shattered the mold of a smiling, loyal spouse that only spoke when told to. She smiled when she wanted to, she spoke when she wanted to. She wasn’t just the First Lady; she was a respected women who had power and used it graciously. Using her voice with intense purpose that defied the behavioral aspects of past First Ladies.

And throughout the book she uses a style of writing that doesn’t sound regal or formal. She writes as if we’re talking over some lemonade in a nice little cafe or something. Like good friends just having a seat under the sun.

Being born and raised in the South Side of Chicago, a place in which one(at the time)would never expect a graduate of Princeton and Harvard to be brought up. Gender and race was a massive spectacle in her life. Especially since she was African American, and a women. She gives a firsthand look into her life as she grew up. Showing the ambitions and everyday occurrences of her life in a neighborhood populated mostly by African American citizens.

Her family lived in the second floor of a brick bungalow. The house itself being owned by her great-aunt and her husband. Her great aunt being a piano teacher; the constant plinks and plunks of the piano keys would be a musical constant in the afternoons. A normalcy in the life of young Michelle LaVaughn Robinson; dubbed “Mich” by her family. Her father worked for the city, working with boilers in a water filtration plant. Her mother stayed at home with Michelle, and Craig, her brother. Her father suffered from multiple sclerosis. A disease in which the immune system eats away at protective coverings on the nerves. Though, I don’t think suffered is the best way to put it.

Like most parents/guardians out there, Fraser and Marian Robinson both made sacrifices, pouring their whole being towards their children and making sure to raise them to be a set of decent human beings to inhabit the busy workplace of adult life. Michelle’s father rarely said anything. If he was feeling pain, he most certainly wouldn’t show it.

Michelle and Craig were both extremely close, growing up, they shared a bedroom, which was basically their living room but with a partition for privacy. Reading of this sibling relationship, it honestly reminded me of my own.

Of course my siblings and I have a more rigorous interrelation.

I’ve come to realize that no matter where you’re from, sibling relationships are all almost the same. Disagreements, backstabbery, getting questioning looks from parents, teaming up in certain moments against a duo of power(aka our parents)sticking up for each other etc. Just one glance and we suddenly have this homologous kinda thing going on in our minds. Thinking in a kind of silent understanding.

Now when my parents read this their gonna be like Ha, silent understanding my face. But seriously when my brother makes something and ends up showing me, or is geeking out over someone television show, he’ll obviously look to my opinion. And one of two things will happen;

“Oh my gosh that’s so(insert melodramatic adjective)!”

or

“Lol noob!”

Either way, both statements are the sibling equivalent of I love you; in any case really. It’s like the secret code of not losing our dignity. But hey all siblings out there are Birthright Besties y’all.

Michelle Robinson in front of her father’s Buick Electra

I would say that Michelle and Craig Robinson had a relationship similar to that. Just less. . .

Morbid.

Their parents trusting them to the point where there was no need to fight. But there would be occasional verbal brawls here and there. Especially at stages of distress. But Mrs. Obama made it clear that she had a childhood that was simple and golden, leading up to the happy memories that kept her going when she was down as she grew up.

In that portion, it kinda gave me a sense that she didn’t want her life to be singled out just because she was the First Lady. I knew there were going to be other signs similar to that one. Possibly for multiple reasons. And it can be interpreted differently. But I like the way she inadvertently emphasized the fact that her life wasn’t like the ones of the previous wives of the president. And not just because she was a African American women.

With leading figures, every movement, word spoken, any basic action; can be taken extremely seriously. With her writing style, she emphasized the fact that she was just as human as anyone else. That her and her husband’s lives shouldn’t be written with bold and italicized. That every simple obscenity shouldn’t be taken as a massive scandal sweeping the internet like an unruly riptide. Of course that seems almost impossible in the dawn of technological advancements and sensitive minds.

One thing I found a little interesting was, the fact that Michelle wanted absolutely nothing to do with the mess that was politics. But instead she would admire the men and women she would see walking the sidewalks in their blazers and suits, walking briskly and carrying themselves with purpose. And Michelle was ambiguous about this as well. To carry herself with the same look of purpose. But what I also learned was that she was a good student and always tried hard, but there would be moments where her grades could be slightly saddening. And I can agree wholeheartedly on that. And ironically, one of my favorite lines that she said(not in the book though, sorry). Is:

“If my future were determined just by my performance on a standardized test, I wouldn’t be here. I guarantee you that.”

And I can agree on that too. I mean look at Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, Gandhi, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Bill Gates. Some dropping out of school, some fighting to protect their country or their rights. Now look at what impact they’ve had on the world! Mickey Mouse now embodies the happiness of children and adults alike, look at any piece of tech in your house and look at the ground breaking changes between the twenty and twenty-first century. You a history nerd? Well the name Alexander Hamilton should be more familiar. Michelle Obama has gone through some hardships of her own, but that never stopped her from being ambitious and setting goals for herself to reach. Especially in school.

While her study in Harvard she was an associate attorney at Sidley & Austin in Chicago. And oh man, this love story I’m about to tell you is literally going to knock you off your feet.

She hated him.

Okay, maybe hate is a strong word.

I think a more suitable adjective would be unimpressed.

Michelle first met Barack Obama when he was taking a position over the summer in the law firm she worked at. And her first impression of the dude was a geek with a massive smile. And cute in a skeptical kinda way. I mean c’mon, a girl’s gotta have her standards. Michelle even attempted to get Barack together with some of her friends. But like most unlikely loves, romance just refused to leave Michelle Robinson without a fight.

Michelle thought he had a peculiar name, he was laid back, maybe even too laid back if you will. He was late to his first interview, and his most casual outfit for an outing( see what I did there?)looked and I quote, “directly out of the closet of Miami Vice.” But as most romances go, they slowly grew closer and enjoyed the minor qualities each one had. But one of my favorite parts in this portion of the book was when Michelle was up late at night with a skeptical looking Barack.

He looked vaguely troubled, as if he were pondering something deeply personal. Was it our relationship? The loss of his father?

“Hey, what’re you thinking about over there?” I whispered.

He turned to look at me, his smile a little sheepish. “Oh,” he said. “I was just thinking about income inequality.”

Income inequality.

INCOME INEQUALITY.

I’ve said some pretty odd things when I’m sleep deprived, *cough*overseas travel*cough*. But it never went to the point where I was having a mental existential crisis.

But it also goes to show just how far their relationship went. I mean look at this adorable picture:

And you could tell just from the looks on their faces. Those are looks of sweet satisfaction from gaining someone in the world to balance you when you’re in a dark state of mind. For example, when Michelle was coping with the death of her father. Or when Barack needed someone to turn to when he was politically stressed out.

And do you know what else this metaphor reminds me of?

Weeble Wobbles.

I remember seeing television commercials of these things when I was a kid. They were these little egg thingies that could literally-NO MATTER HOW HARD YOU TRY-get knocked over. I used to play with them in my kindergarten classroom too. And while everyone else found it absolutely hilarious when they would just wobble around, I would be furiously trying to press them down hard enough so they wouldn’t just teeter back up again. Just thinking about the trauma of that gives me a migraine.

*shudder*

Anyway, the only reason they reminded me of Michelle and Barack is they didn’t always have a steady relationship, they could always depend on each other. Morale of the story is,

Find someone to be the weeble to your wobble.

That is the end of my TED Talk.

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Here’s a short excerpt from Becoming, in which Michelle circulates in the early stages of her marriage with Barack.

“It sounds a little like a bad joke, doesn’t it? What happens when a solitude-loving individualist marries an outgoing family woman who does not love solitude one bit?

The answer, I’m guessing, is probably the best and most sustaining answer to nearly every question arising inside a marriage, no matter who you are or what the issue is: you find ways to adapt. If you’re in it for ever, there’s really no choice.

Which is to say that at the start of 1993, Barack flew to Bali and spent about five weeks living alone with his thoughts while working on a draft of his book Dreams from My Father, filling yellow legal pads with his fastidious handwriting, distilling his ideas during languid daily walks amid the coconut palms and lapping tide. I, meanwhile, stayed home on Euclid Avenue, living upstairs from my mother, Marian, as another leaden Chicago winter descended, shellacking the trees and sidewalks with ice. I kept myself busy, seeing friends and hitting workout classes in the evenings. In my regular interactions at work or around town, I’d find myself casually uttering this strange new term – “my husband”. My husband and I are hoping to buy a home. My husband is a writer finishing a book. It was foreign and delightful and conjured memories of a man who simply wasn’t there. I missed Barack terribly, but I rationalized our situation as I could, understanding that even if we were newlyweds, this interlude was probably for the best

He had taken the chaos of his unfinished book and shipped himself out to do battle with it. Possibly this was out of kindness to me, a bid to keep the chaos out of my view. I’d married an outside-the-box thinker, I had to remind myself. He was handling his business in what struck him as the most sensible and efficient manner, even if outwardly it appeared to be a beach vacation – a honeymoon with himself (I couldn’t help but think in my lonelier moments) to follow his honeymoon with me.

You and I, you and I, you and I. We were learning to adapt, to knit ourselves into a solid and for ever form of us. Even if we were the same two people we’d always been, the same couple we’d been for years, we now had new labels, a second set of identities to wrangle. He was my husband. I was his wife. We’d stood up at church and said it out loud, to each other and to the world. It did feel as if we owed each other new things.

 For many women, including myself, “wife” can feel like a loaded word. It carries a history. If you grew up in the 1960s and 1970s as I did, wives seemed to be a genus of white women who lived inside television sitcoms – cheery, coiffed, corseted. They stayed at home, fussed over the children, and had dinner ready on the stove. They sometimes got into the sherry or flirted with the vacuum-cleaner salesman, but the excitement seemed to end there.

Personally, as a kid, I preferred The Mary Tyler Moore Show, which I absorbed with fascination. Mary had a job, a snappy wardrobe, and really great hair. She was independent and funny, and unlike those of the other ladies on TV, her problems were interesting. She had conversations that weren’t about children or homemaking. She didn’t let Lou Grant boss her around, and she wasn’t fixated on finding a husband. She was youthful and at the same time grown-up. In the pre- pre- pre-internet landscape, when the world came packaged almost exclusively through three channels of network TV, this stuff mattered. If you were a girl with a brain and a dawning sense that you wanted to grow into something more than a wife,

And here I was now, 29 years old, sitting in the very same apartment where I’d watched all that TV and consumed all those meals dished up by the patient and selfless Marian Robinson. I had so much – an education, a healthy sense of self, a deep arsenal of ambition – and I was wise enough to credit my mother, in particular, with instilling it in me.

She’d taught me how to read before I started kindergarten, helping me sound out words as I sat curled like a kitten in her lap, studying a library copy of Dick and Jane. She’d cooked for us with care, putting broccoli and brussels sprouts on our plates and requiring that we eat them. She’d hand sewn my prom dress, for God’s sake. The point was, she’d given diligently and she’d given everything. She’d let our family define her. I was old enough now to realize that all the hours she gave to me and my brother, Craig, were hours she didn’t spend on herself.

My considerable blessings in life were now causing a kind of psychic whiplash. I’d been raised to be confident and see no limits, to believe I could go after and get absolutely anything I wanted. And I wanted everything. I wanted to live with the hat-tossing, independent-career-woman zest of Mary Tyler Moore, and at the same time I gravitated toward the stabilizing, self-sacrificing, seemingly bland normalcy of being a wife and mother. I wanted to have a work life and a home life, but with some promise that one would never fully squelch the other. I hoped to be exactly like my own mother and at the same time nothing like her at all. It was an odd and confounding thing to ponder. Could I have everything? Would I have everything? I had no idea.”

Reading her book, she also emphasized herself in a way that didn’t make you feel like she was on a whole different level on the social scale. She is just as human as anyone else. She accentuated that by giving us a detailed verbal tour of her everyday life when it came to balancing family and her career.

Her daughters, at the time of her husband’s campaigning; were both young and had needs only their mother could provide. And in the early stages of her husband’s campaign trail Mrs. Obama was advised by her husband’s team to spend time with Democrats in specific states. I believe her first mission was to go to every corner of Iowa, and win over leaders, address groups of citizens, etc. Basically having to fly to Iowa every week and talk to a bunch of strangers and kiss other people’s babies. On top of that, she had her own career as a the Vice President of Community and External Affairs for the University of Chicago Hospitals.

And aside from all of that, there was always one question running through her head;

“Am I good enough?”

This is a question a lot of other people my age ask too. Everyday when we pass a mirror, when someone gets a higher score on a test, when someone is more likeable at school. But also because of the way society depicts us. She would ask this question in her head when she was in different job positions, when she became First Lady of the United States.

I’m willing to talk to a lot of people and I find satisfaction in stating my opinion to everyone with a spunk and pride. But, I’m not the most social person either. And when reading this area of the book, I could relation on a personal level every time she questioned whether she was good enough for a high position in society.  But look at the pride in her face. That all of the questioning and struggling was worth it. The sigh of relief when you realize Hey people actually like us for who we are! and the look of And if they don’t? So what?

I’m going to stop right here and say that Michelle Obama has become and even more admirable person to me ever since I finished reading her book and I hope you can have the same experience by at least skimming a copy or a PDF of it. Glancing over the book jacket would suffice! Reason I’m stopping here is because the rest of the book gives insight on her life in the White House and things she had to live with and learn in her time as FLOTUS. And if I typed it out here, in the open for everyone to read. It was spoil the joy of reading it for yourself. So one last thing before I sign off.

You can be the king,

but watch the queen conquer.

– Anonymous