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Gregory Rec/Staff PhotographerOn Wednesday afternoon, long after the celebratory drums had stopped and the cheering revelers had emptied out of Portland's Monument Square, the Rev. Mutima Peter took a moment to reflect on a historic night in American politics.
His emotions, he said, circled back to a single word: Hope.
With the election of Barak Obama, "I felt America can go beyond and above racial divides that have been in this country for years," said Peter, pastor of International Christian Fellowship, which has parishioners from about 15 countries. "The people of the world would see that if America can change and do what we have seen, they can do it, too.
"It was a shock of joy, and seeing the change and knowing the lesson that this would be."
As the reality of Obama's victory settled in on Wednesday, Mainers of different ages, cultural traditions and racial backgrounds talked of their great sense of hope for the future. It was a welcome emotion for many of them, on the heels of a bitter presidential race and an economic crisis without precedent in recent U.S. history.
In Maine, 58 percent of voters chose Obama, while 40 percent selected Republican John McCain.
"Monday I felt awful. Most of Tuesday, I felt awful. Today I feel great," said Art Pillsbury, a 39-year-old painter and carpenter from Portland.
"I'm hopeful that with some new ideas and with someone who can inspire, the direction of the country will change for the better," Pillsbury said. "We can't just keep doing the same things and expect our standard of living to get better. Most of the people I know are just barely getting by, and it's been like that for a long time."
Pillsbury is an independent who voted for Bush twice and has generally supported Republican candidates in earlier elections. On Tuesday, though, he chose to vote for the Democratic nominee, partly because of Pillsbury's sense that Obama was building a movement that was indeed different than politics as usual.
"Great ideas and policies don't mean anything if you can't motivate people to act," Pillsbury said. "Obama brings that."
Meanwhile, Bob Greene, a 72-year-old black man and South Portland resident, said the election gives him firmer belief in the message of hope handed down to him by his own family. Greene's great-great-great-great grandfather, Christopher Manuel, was a prominent abolitionist whose barber shop was a gathering spot for politicians and activists in the early 1800s.
"It means that the American dream is available for not only me, but my great grandchildren," he said. "That they can be whatever they want to be. That is what my parents and grandparents told me. That is the reason I became a journalist when no blacks were doing that."
Greene, who grew up in Portland in the 1940s and 1950s, worked as a journalist for The Associated Press for 36 years. An independent voter, Greene said race factored into his decision to vote for Obama, but not in the way some might imagine.
"It took me a while to argue with myself, to say why I was voting for Obama. Was it because he was black? I wanted to make sure (race) was not the reason," Greene said. That mindset, he determined, would be the same as that of someone who would vote against Obama simply because he is a person of color.
So, rather than make a snap judgement, Greene followed the presidential debates and thought about his choice.
Ultimately, he agreed with former Secretary of State Colin Powell, who praised Obama's ability to unite people. Greene also agreed with Powell's suggestion that McCain appeared uncertain about how to handle the economic crisis.
Greene does take pride in the fact that Americans, for the first time, chose a president who is not a white male of European descent. The choice reflects the diversity of the nation, he said.
"The gaining of the presidency by Barack Obama has signaled everybody around the world that America has changed,...
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