The White Fence

28. The Summer Project

            When you’re sixteen years old and into politics, your age can be your biggest vice. Even though I still had five years to go before I could vote, I still kept up with the debates and the candidates that were running, because the upcoming presidential election was one of the most exciting that history promised (okay, maybe not the most exciting, but it was certainly pivotal). It was the first national election that blacks would have the right to vote in, en masse. It was also the first national election that I followed fervently.

            I believed, unflinchingly, that the best candidate for president was the current president. Johnson was exactly what the country needed right now. Despite that we were still in Vietnam, the things that he’d been able to accomplish domestically, especially the legislation he’d passed in order to advance civil rights, was worth commendation. But, the war was damning, and people expected him to be just like Kennedy, and he wasn’t. I was convinced, though, that if he could just get reelected, he’d be able to prove that he was the best choice, but unfortunately I was strongly outnumbered in this opinion; even his own party disagreed with me.

            To me, the choice that the Republicans seemed to highly favor was far more incompetent than Johnson ever showed himself to be, and was the antithesis of the current change we were seeking. I didn’t like Nixon, but I didn’t really think he had much chance of winning, either. Nixon was a snake in the grass; he’d proven that while he was still Vice President. And even though I’d mostly sided with the Republican view in the past, I just couldn’t see a Republican becoming president; not in this election anyway. The momentum was certainly with the Democrats. The Dems would end the war, bring the boys home, and, just for good measure, extend equal rights, equal access, and equal justice to every American citizen. The question, though, was which Democrat.

            McCarthy had the experience and anti-war stance, Humphrey, the support of the politicians, labor unions, and more of a concept of what being president entailed, and Bobby…Bobby was JFK’s brother, and people still felt cheated about the abrupt end to our Camelot president’s reign. He was also a staunch Civil Rightser, and I believed that he would stand up better against Nixon in debate, too. After all, Bobby was better looking, more charismatic, and a Kennedy had already beaten Nixon once…

            While the candidates were gearing up for a promising political summer, and state by state we got closer to knowing who the Democrat presidential candidate would be, I got my acceptance into Harvard’s summer scholar’s program. With the acceptance in my hand, it finally felt like I could let out the breath I’d been holding in since I started high school. It took every ounce of restraint I had not to march into Mrs. Rupert’s office to show her the letter. The thought of what awaited me over the summer, though, was enough to humble me into telling only my family, Patrice, and Derek.

            A few days before I was supposed to be leaving for Boston, I was over at Derek’s, as usual, finding busy work in order to help the time pass by. Derek was at his easel, and he must have been thinking about the piece that he was currently working on all day, because once he sat down, his brush didn’t still. I loved the way Derek looked whenever he got lost in his work, and I kept getting lost observing the occurrence.

            He paused, suddenly, turning towards me, laying his brush down for the first time in hours. “You’re leavin’ for Boston, soon, right?” he questioned.

            “On Friday,” I replied. I surprised myself by how detached I managed to sound speaking those words.

            He seemed preoccupied by something. “How long you goinna be gone?” 

            I tried to figure out the meaning behind the cadence of his tone, his posture, his questioning. “I’ll be back the week before school gets back in.” I thought I mentioned this at some point, but I might not have. Although Boston was pretty much the only thing that I’d been thinking about for the past couple of days, I didn’t bring it up around Derek all that often.