The XX Factor: Slate women blog about politics, etc...

Teddy's Season of Hope

In August of 1980, I watched Teddy Kennedy's convention speech from the basement of a Holy Cross retreat house in Colorado Springs, where a bunch of us who had just graduated from Notre Dame and had signed up to spend a service year working in inner city schools and neighborhoods and parishes across the country were getting together for a few days before heading off to our various assignments. Nothing against Jimmy Carter, but I doubt there was a single one of us who hadn't been pulling for Kennedy that year, and he spoke directly to us and made us cry but also filled us with hope:

And someday, long after this convention, long after the signs come down and the crowds stop cheering, and the bands stop playing, may it be said of our campaign that we kept the faith.

May it be said of our Party in 1980 that we found our faith again.

And may it be said of us, both in dark passages and in bright days, in the words of Tennyson that my brothers quoted and loved, and that have special meaning for me now:

I am a part of all that I have met
To [Tho] much is taken, much abides
That which we are, we are—

One equal temper of heroic hearts
Strong in will
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

For me, a few hours ago, this campaign came to an end.

For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.

Tonight, watching him walk and talk a little haltingly, and listening to him quote from that 1980 speech, how could anyone not be torn up and yet thrilled, too, all over again, that his work and ours really does go on. There he was, battling brain cancer and yet showing up, not quite steady on his feet but still passionate about universal health care, uncertain of his own future but still so confident in ours, truly passing the torch not just to Barack Obama, but to all of us: "I pledge I will be there next January,'' to vote for health care reform, he said. "For me, this is a season of hope .. the work begins anew, the hope rises again, and the dream lives on.''