Becoming

In Chapter 9, Michelle sees firsthand what made Barack an effective community organizer before he went to law school. Community organizers, like Barack, teach members of underprivileged communities how to instigate change for themselves, rather than waiting and hoping for someone else to do it for them. Barack believes in peoples’ ability to work for a better future, and though he knows it won’t be easy, he encourages people to put faith in themselves: “Amid the parishioners’ fears and frustrations, their disenfranchisement and sinking helplessness, he was somewhat brashly pointing an arrow in the opposite direction” (117). In watching him at work, Michelle also recognizes that her goals, though laudable, have been focused on improving herself, rather than the world around her. In contrast, Barack’s philosophy is not just “to get yourself out of a stuck place” but to “try and get the place itself unstuck” (117).

Though Michelle doesn’t realize it at the time, she is witnessing firsthand the experiences that will shape Barack’s philosophy and beliefs that go on to make him the future president of the United States of America. Barack’s encounter at the community center is a smaller version of what he will endeavor to do on a much larger scale as the President: convincing others to hope for and work toward a better kind of future. For many people, Barack Obama is a larger-than-life figure, and Michelle spends much of her memoir humanizing him, offering insights into the man. In this chapter, for instance, she talks about his reluctance to talk on the phone when they’re dating long-distance and the ramshackle furniture in his apartment. Michelle doesn’t do this to tear Barack down, but rather to erase the idea that he’s superhuman; anyone, Michelle believes, can be a great force for change. However, in instances such as these, Michelle acknowledges the things about her husband that make him extraordinary and foreshadow the future that he will have.

Michelle has talked about the sacrifices her parents made for their children. Both Fraser and Marian work at jobs that pay the bills but don’t provide much in terms of intellectual stimulus or emotional payoff. The Robinsons forego buying a house and save all their money to send Craig and Michelle to Princeton and then on to pursue higher degrees. Fraser neglects his health out of a sense of pride, but also because he doesn’t want to hamper his children’s lives in any way. In her youth, Michelle doesn’t always understand these sacrifices. Though she appreciates how hard they work and everything they do for her, Michelle’s parents have always encouraged her to aim high in life. Michelle accomplishes this in terms of getting a good education and having job stability, but she realizes she remains unfulfilled.

Michelle expresses this to her mother, but it isn’t until later in life that Michelle realizes how stark a contrast there was between her and Marian and their outlooks on life: “Fulfillment, I’m sure, struck her as a rich person’s conceit. I doubt that my parents, in their thirty years together, had even once discussed it” (135). Marian comes from a generation of working hard, putting her family first always, and worrying about her own wants and needs last; Michelle admires her parents and appreciates all they’ve done, but she nonetheless prizes personal happiness and fulfillment along with the work ethic and love of family that they have instilled in her. She writes, “I didn’t exactly want a life like my parents had. I didn’t want to live in the same house forever, work the same job, and never claim any space for myself” (138). Michelle’s difference from her parents is common to children who go on to receive a better education and better job prospects than their parents. Neither Michelle nor her parents are right or wrong, but the opportunities Michelle’s parents have worked so hard to give her have allowed Michelle to hope for different things in life than her parents could have anticipated.  

In Chapter 11, Michelle decides to take a chance and accept a job at city hall. The job is risky in many ways because she’ll be starting on a new career with which she has no experience and leaving behind the comfort and security of her position at the law firm. Another aspect that makes her choice risky is that Michelle has always distrusted politics: “Politics had traditionally been used against black folks, as a means to keep us isolated and excluded, leaving us undereducated, unemployed, and underpaid” (172). Michelle also has some qualms because one of the important black figureheads in Chicago politics, Harold Washington, recently died. Washington was a black mayor who stood up to the discrimination and oppression embedded in city politics, and many people looked to him as a sort of savior figure, hoping he could single-handedly fix all the city’s problems.

After he dies, a white mayor from the usual stock of politicians is elected, seemingly dismantling Washington’s legacy. Yet Michelle recognizes that it is a mistake to put “all our hopes for reform on the shoulders of one person without building the political apparatus to support his vision” (180). Human beings, like Harold Washington, are mortal and fallible and can’t be expected to carry the load all on their own; change must be made within the system or, like in Washington’s case, any hope for change dies with the man. Michelle uses this anecdote to foreshadow some of the trials she and Barack will face during his presidency. Michelle does not directly connect the two men, except to say that Barack was inspired by Washington’s vision, but the parallels between their circumstances are striking: Both are inspirational black political figures who people hoped would make huge changes within the political system. Like Washington, Barack is often critiqued for not bringing about enough change during his time in office. However, Michelle suggests here that one man cannot make all the difference. People must be willing to do their part to enact change within broken systems, which is why Michelle decides to take a leap of faith and change careers.