History's first draft: Two African American gay men reflect on inauguration

Just a few hours after Barack Hussein Obama became the first black man in U.S. history to take the presidential oath of office, Bay Windows caught up by phone with two local men, Douglas Brooks, the executive director of JRI Health, and David Wilson, the board president of MassEquality and a plaintiff in the Goodridge marriage lawsuit, both of who attended the inaugural festivities in Washington, D.C. Brooks attended some inaugural festivities with his friend Stephen J. DeVincent, a former Bostonian who now lives in D.C., while Wilson traveled to the Capitol with his husband Rob Compton.

Here, in their own words -- with some editing for clarity and length -- is what they experienced at the dawning of a new political era and as our nation wrote a redemptive chapter in its history.

Douglas Brooks: 'Everything has newfound meaning'

Being present for the inauguration of Barack Obama as President of the United States of America was the most profound experience of my life. I sent an e-mail to friends before I left home this morning. In it I wrote that I was taking all of them to Capitol Hill in my heart and that having been a boy in Macon, Georgia, where my pediatrician's office, which was a private pediatrician's office where my parents had insurance and paid cash, had separate waiting rooms for black patients and white patients. And to go from there to sitting in front of the Capitol building watching a black man being sworn in as president of the United States of America is, it's overwhelming, it's exciting it's moving, it's almost indescribable -- I have nothing to which to compare it, right? It's just profoundly moving.

I actually arrived here on Saturday and I was at the concert at the Lincoln Memorial on Sunday and that was an amazing experience. And that's part of it, too, is the community of people from not only around the country but around the world, people who descended on Washington, D.C. to be here. I was with a couple of folks, you know we danced and we sang and there was all these people around us and I was with this friend who I'm really close with and we were hanging on each other and hugging. You know, it was clear we were gay guys, and people were so welcoming and it just wasn't a thing.

Then this morning at the swearing-in, Stephen and I were together and I actually had my Obama pin on with the rainbow flag that we created for Pride back in June when we had an Obama contingent. A woman sitting behind me was from Chicago and she saw my pin and she says, "Oh my god that pin is so beautiful." ... I thought, "Okay, does she know what this means?" And she went on to say to me, "My brother's partner was a Republican who actually voted for Obama and campaigned for Obama." And I said, "This pin is yours to take back to him." I said, "I have another one at home; you can take this one back to him."

They were just so sweet and open and after the president had been inaugurated Stephen and I kissed each other on the lips and she and her husband, or her male companion, kissed each other on the lips. ... There were two other gay guys -- you know, we know our own -- in the row behind us and just a couple [seats] down. And I don't know if they were a couple or just close friends like me and Stephen but they were definitely close. And just the feeling of, oh my god, it really can be this way. And when we have a president who is leading us that way, what could this mean?

Then when Rick Warren came up to pray, some had suggested that perhaps we turn our backs to him or whatever. And I thought about it for a moment, I thought you know as angry and disappointed and confused --and that's what I was more than anything, I was just confused --I was not going to turn my back on him. I'm a Christian and I'm going to just bow my head and listen to his prayer. I turned to Stephen --and he was not in the same place I was -- and said, 'We'll tolerate this too, we can get through this and he'll be gone and Re Re will come out and sing something fabulous, so ..." And so we bowed our heads, we listened to the prayer, it was over and I'd forgotten that he had ever been there by the time Aretha Franklin got up to sing. And that was amazing. It was just so amazing to be sitting there and to see the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin, singing and I knew she was going to sing my Country 'Tis of Thee. ... I could just hear her singing that so soulfully, and with newfound meaning.

And so to bring us back to the question -- what's going on for me -- a big part of what's going on for me is everything has newfound meaning. When we stood to sing the National Anthem it had newfound meaning for me. I really felt like the land of the free and that black people have moved to a new level of freedom, that gay people have moved to a new level of freedom. Do I think we've reached the pinnacle of freedom? No. But do I think we have opportunities to work toward it and reach new heights? I do. And I really strongly believe that our new president is committed to it. And we'll see.

David Wilson: 'Finally I feel like I'm in the majority'

Well to begin with, there were more people of color in this city this weekend then I've seen in my entire life -- maybe added up through all my years of life -- and it's just very hard for me to describe what it's like to be with so many people who look like me. So that's kind of where I start with my thought process. Finally I feel like I'm in the majority, here, this weekend. And I'm never, ever [in the majority] wherever I am, whatever I'm doing; it doesn't matter whether it's a cocktail party or it's having a drink at a bar. I'm always one of a few.

Everywhere I have been since we got here on Saturday, starting at Reagan National Airport -- there were hundreds of black and brown people walking down the corridor to get their bags. It's just an amazing thing. I have not grown up in the Caribbean or in Africa but this is what it must feel like to be in a country where you're in the majority.

Sort of second to that, I think race has been an issue that the entire country has struggled with for many, many years. And I can be more specific; our [LGBT] community struggles with it, too. Looking for ways to include people of color, whether it's the United States of America or it's our GLBT community in Boston, we struggle every single day with, how do we reach out and include people of color so that they are at the table and contributing? So to be part of a majority of people who are in this city today and to think about all of our struggles, at times it's overwhelming because I think we have really turned a corner here.

But I've been in the marriage movement, so certainly in the marriage movement our numbers get even smaller when you talk about people of color. People might not know this about me, but I identify first as a black man. That's how people see me, that's how strangers see me, that's how I'm greeted in stores, at counters, hotels, airports --as a black man. So that's my identity and now I see an opportunity through President Obama to actually be invited not as a minority member but as potentially a majority member --when you talk about people of color in this country our numbers are growing in leaps and bounds. So it's just a wonderful feeling to be part of the movement here, [to] know what President Obama is planning and then to think about our own community and all the work that is ahead of us and it's starting right now.

And it's starting with someone not from our [LGBT] community but certainly someone from my community as an African American man, so there's just a lot of symbolism here for me. As I think about where we're going, what our movement is going to mean in the future, just maybe we will not be an afterthought. When I say 'we,' I mean the African American community will not be an afterthought both in the country, and in the GLBT community, in the marriage movement. I mean after Prop. 8 the hue and cry was, "Well why didn't we have the communities of color with us?" Well how much work was done in communities of color? Very little. So again, rather than react to things that often don't come out the way we'd like to, it feels today like we're going to be more in a proactive position. We're going to be moving this ball forward all together, not reaching back and bringing people along or adding people along the way but actually people will be at the table when the conversation begins. They'll begin the conversation rather than be at the tail end --and that's how I've felt my entire life. I'm always asked for an opinion ... but it's generally after the majority group has made some key decisions on the direction that we're going in. This feels different. This feels very different.

Every event that I have attended since Sunday has been close to if not fifty percent people of color. Obviously this will feel different tonight, because I'm going to the GLBT Out for Equality ball tonight. It will feel like I've taken a step backwards. And now I'm with my [LGBT] community, I'm with the people that I serve on boards with, that I've done work with but I will be in the minority tonight. ... Really, the only ball I'm going to go to is our Out for Equality ball and I will be in the minority and it just is a red flag to me that we have a lot of work to do.

But I'm inspired, I'm encouraged, I really feel very positive about where we're moving. Part of it has to do with people like President Obama and Vice President Biden, who are speaking up for us, speaking on our behalf. Not that our voices haven't been heard and haven't been validated but it's always great. And I say this so often: when I'm in a room with people and somebody speaks up for the communities of color and it's not me, I feel so empowered because that person can say often what I can't say, or can be heard in a way that I can't be heard. So we've turned a corner and clearly our community is going to be playing catch up. We have to look at our boards, across this country, of all of our LGBT organizations. All of our boards need to have representation from the communities of color. All of our programs and projects and events, everything we do across this country, we need to reflect what has just happened this weekend.