The partnership between Barack and Michelle Obama -- complete with candor, fist bumps and public affection -- has been essential to his fast rise up the political mountain. There were moments when his ambition and long stretches away from the family got to her, especially when their daughters were younger. The Democratic nominee-in-waiting has recalled times when, as a state legislator, he would return home and be lucky to get more than a lukewarm peck on the cheek.
Monday night, Michelle took the stage for herself, not just to reaffirm how wonderful her husband is, and what a fine president he would make, but also to redefine herself. But before mounting the podium, she gathered herself backstage in a holding room near the lockers of Denver's professional hockey team. Big moments demand big performances, and she seemed determined not to let the occasion rattle her, but to soar above it.
Her brother, Craig Robinson, the Oregon State basketball coach and one of the Ivy League's all-time leading scorers, was loose: "I'm terrific. Very excited." But then he was summoned back to the holding room, to make sure he didn't mess up the moment with some fashion faux pas. "My sister wanted to make sure my tie was straight," he said. His bright orange tie.
Right before it was time to head onstage, Michelle took a deep breath, straightened the lines on her dress and then, to whoops from family and aides, walked down the hall like it was game time. She stood beneath the podium for a few minutes and listened to her brother introduce her.
When it was finally her turn to address the convention delegates and a national televised audience, she described herself as a sister, a mom, a wife and a daughter, someone who loves her country and has tried to give back to it.
One day, she told the crowd, her children's children and future generations will tell the story of "how this time we listened to our hopes, instead of our fears. How this time, we decided to stop doubting and to start dreaming."
Extra pressure
Batting first in the prime-time Democratic lineup may have put some extra pressure on her -- she was super serious, barely able to find a smile during an early morning practice session in the convention hall here. But by the time it was over, the blue Michelle signs were hoisted in every delegation, and she swayed her hips a little to Stevie Wonder's "Isn't She Lovely," as daughters Sasha and Malia also got into the groove.
That dynamic duo tried to steal the show when their mother was done, telling their daddy, who appeared in the hall via video conference, that Mommy had done great. And that they loved him. And, "what city are you in, Daddy?" asked Sasha.
Some delegates and convention-goers seemed mesmerized by Michelle's performance.
"Oh, my God, do you believe it?" said Marsha Campbell, a Denver elementary school teacher, her hands cupped over her mouth. "I think she's one of the most dynamic women I've ever listened to. Not only is she dynamic, she's smart, down to earth. I think she is the perfect reflection of what every woman in America would like to be."
Campbell was still milling about the hall, long after the evening had ended, kind of in a happy trancelike state. "I'm not kidding you," she went on about Michelle's speech and poise. "Have you ever?"
Shaping her image for a national audience
Aides have been frustrated by some of the portrayals of Michelle as sharp, driven, unpatriotic. Shaping her image for a national audience was as important a part of the night's program as her testimonial on behalf of her husband.
A biographical video narrated by Michelle's mother, Marian Robinson, highlighted her daughter's working-class upbringing on Chicago's South Side. Michelle's father, Fraser Robinson, was a Chicago water department employee who rarely missed a day at work until the day he died from multiple sclerosis, while Marian stayed home and raised two children who went on to Princeton. Now, Grandma Robinson is back at it, helping to raise the girls while their parents are on the campaign trail trying to make history.
"South Side Girl" features appearances by some of those who have worked closely with Michelle and remain friends: Jobi Cates, who worked with Michelle in the early 1990s at Public Allies, a youth leadership training program. Yvonne Davila, who met Michelle 20 years ago when they were young staffers in the office of Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley. Travis Rejman, who created the Goldin Institute, dedicated to supporting grass-roots efforts to alleviate poverty and sustain the environment. Charles Ogletree, a Harvard Law School professor and mentor of Michelle's.
Whether through film or speech or testimonial, the effort on Monday night was to frame Michelle in a way that would help Americans see her as the next first lady.
"The point was really to introduce Michelle to the public for the first time and let them see that she is very different from the caricatures displayed in the news," said Ogletree, an adviser who has spoken with her periodically throughout the campaign. "Michelle is not a politician. She is a mother and a wife and a working woman and a community organizer."
And by that, he meant someone whose presentation of herself and her relationship with her husband is not always politically careful. "She tells you what she feels, what she senses," Ogletree said.
That has sometimes meant talking about Obama's morning breath or bluntly expressing surprise at how rock-star-like he became so quickly. There is Barack Obama the genius, the first black president of the Harvard Law Review, the best-selling author, the Grammy Award winner, she told a New York audience in 2007. And then there is the Barack Obama she lives with.
"That guy's not as impressive," she said to much laughter. "He still has trouble putting the bread up and putting his socks actually in the dirty clothes, and he still doesn't do a better job than our 5-year-old daughter, Sasha, making his bed. So you have to forgive me if I'm a little stunned by this whole Barack Obama thing."
Stunned, but squarely in his corner now. She also has been stunned by some of the hits on her image. Unwittingly, she has occasionally given her opponents some delicious sound bites to feast on and circulate, most notably when she said back in February: "For the first in my adult life, I am proud of my country because it feels like hope is finally making a comeback."
Most of the folks in her orbit understood what she meant -- the "hope" part was the key phrase, "hope" and "change" being the language associated with her husband's candidacy. Ogletree said it is not her instinct to filter her thoughts, but now the stakes are so high and the race so close that it is crucial to show "who she is and why she loves America."
Sacrifices for his dreams
Many working women recognize the sacrifices Michelle Obama has made for her husband to follow his dreams. After all, she, too, graduated from Harvard Law School and could have been a senior partner in one of Chicago's prestigious law firms. She was a University of Chicago hospital executive before dialing down her own career to hit the trail for Barack. Michelle Obama is somebody, too, her friends say.
"The selfish part of her would say she wants him home for her children," said Valerie Jarrett, a close friend of the Obamas. "But for the sake of her children, she wants him to win this election."
Being a political wife was much tougher for her when the children, now 10 and 7, were small, Jarrett said, and Michelle didn't believe politics was the best conduit to serve people. Public service was always her interest, and Barack's. But as she began to see her husband having an impact as an elected official, she softened some. "So I think they're at a different point in their life now," said Jarrett. "But there is a sacrifice. I don't want to underestimate that."
Speaking to the convention crowd, Michelle talked not just of the candidate who could be president but of the guy she married. "And in the end," she said, "after all that's happened these past 19 months, the Barack Obama I know today is the same man I fell in love with 19 years ago. He's the same man who drove me and our new baby daughter home from the hospital 10 years ago this summer, inching along at a snail's pace, peering anxiously at us in the rearview mirror, feeling the whole weight of her future in his hands, determined to give her everything he'd struggled so hard for himself, determined to give her what he never had: the affirming embrace of a father's love."