Laura Sky Brown, Jan. 21, 2013 on the occasion of the public inauguration ceremony of President Barack Obama.

I was never the kind of person who went to mass events. I could not imagine lining up overnight for concert tickets, crowding in to Times Square to watch the ball drop on New Year’s Eve, or sitting in the midst of thousands at a music festival.

So it’s a little bit amazing that I have now attended not one but two presidential inaugurations. Both times, I have been motivated almost entirely by the desire to give my middle son Henry a thrill. Henry is the guy among my four children who will sit down and watch “Hardball” and CNN with me, who has incisive commentary on political issues, and who understands how to listen to rhetoric and pull out the essential elements (and root out the crap buried inside). I harbor not-so-secret hopes that he will go into political life, although he is reserved and introverted – so as a strategist, not as a candidate.

At this inauguration – much as at the one in 2009 – the event for me was all about the people. We did get to see the President, we did get to be present at important national events, but what was most valuable was to see and interact with people from all over the country. We had our pictures taken by people from Florida, we stood in line behind people from Minnesota, and we sat across a cafe table from a New Yorker. We walked down the street behind a photographer from the White House press corps.

So many people brought little kids with them. You might say that is a crazy idea, perhaps even dangerous – taking a five-year-old or even a ten-year-old into a huge mass of people. You’d be wrong. Most of them had wide eyes that were taking it all in, and you could picture them in 50 years telling their grandchildren how they were there. What would I give, in retrospect, to have been dragged to the inauguration of Richard Nixon in the 1960s or to have seen the Carters get out of the car and walk in their inaugural parade when I was a teenager?

As for the inaugural speech, yes, we could have heard and seen it a lot better at home on MSNBC. But there is something so much better about hearing a speech sail through the air when you are standing in the crowd, knowing the speaker is right over there if you stand on tiptoe and squint. The bracing cool weather made it even better, somehow. I was riveted to the spot listening, thrilled and even a bit shocked to realize that I was hearing truly progressive ideas stated with firm confidence.

In the four short years between Henry at age 13 in 2009 and Henry at age 17 right now, our national climate has changed to the point where, yes, he just heard President Obama firmly support gay rights in the middle of the second inaugural address. I stood there thinking: Did I really hear the president of the United States name Stonewall alongside Selma? Yes, it really happened. As a kid with two moms, Henry really did stand next to me and hear Obama’s confident affirmation ringing over the loudspeakers, live. I can still hear it if I close my eyes.

We decided not to try to get into the parade crowds. Somehow, being present at the swearing-in ceremonies was exactly enough. We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around, people watching. We’re already talking about January 2017. I don’t know who will be standing with his or her hand on a Bible to be sworn in as our next president, but if it’s Hillary Clinton, we are so there.

Because of Henry, I am now the kind of person who would wade boldly into a crowd of a million to have an Inauguration Day experience. Not only that, but I would recommend it to anybody to try.

Henry Brown: “An Achievement of Shared Ideals”

Four years ago, on Christmas Day, my mom told me that together we would be attending the inauguration of the 44th president of the United States, Barack Obama. I was in eighth grade at the time, and the experience of being among hundreds of thousands of people in celebration of an achievement of shared ideals was something completely new and unprecedented for me.

Henry Brown, Jan. 21, 2013 on the occasion of the public inauguration ceremony of President Barack Obama.

It is now four years later, I am a senior in high school, and Obama has been re-elected for a second term as president. I paid very close attention to the president’s campaign and to the 2012 presidential election, and knew even before the day of the election that I would be attending the second inauguration of Barack Obama.

The greatest things about attending the inauguration this year are, first, that not only is a Democratic politician spending four more years as president, but that politician is Barack Obama, whom I believe to know the issues of both the United States and the world, and who has the best interest of the American people in mind. Second, the number of people who came out to Washington, D.C., to show support for the second term of the Obama administration was made only more fantastic by the mood of extreme excitement and happiness shared by everybody in the city.

This year we had tickets to what was called the “yellow zone,” which was a segment of the city close to the Capitol building – so for the actual inauguration, we were only about 500 feet from the Capitol. If not for the trees, I could have seen perfectly. I hope to go back to the next inauguration, by which time I will have voted in the election. I am so glad I was part of these two historical events.

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Laura Sky Brown and Henry Brown in Washington D.C. in front of the Washington monument Jan. 20, 2013.

This year they’ve headed back to our nation’s capital to watch the public inauguration ceremony on Jan. 21.  The 20th amendment to the U.S. Constitution set the end of each presidential term at noon on Jan. 20. So President Obama took the actual oath of office on Jan. 20 in a private ceremony.

Laura and Henry are filing brief updates along the way, in the spirit of The Chronicle’s traditional Election Day coverage of the polls. 

19 January 10:44 p.m. (Toledo, Ohio Amtrak Station): Henry and I are waiting inside a festive station full of travelers en route to the inauguration. Cameraman from Channel 13 Toledo is doing a little video reporting in the waiting area. Train will leave at 11:15 p.m.

20 January noon (Washington, D.C. Union Station): We came in by Amtrak train from Toledo, which left at 11:15 p.m. and arrived just past noon at Washington’s Union Station. Among the other passengers, most of whom were on their way here for the inauguration, there was a group of 28 people traveling together who were mostly older, very well-dressed African American women from Toledo. A news reporter from the Toledo ABC affiliate was there with a camera doing some interviews.

 20 January (Rayburn House Office Building, Dingell’s Office): On arrival at Union Station, we walked over to the Rayburn House Office Building. Along the way we passed other Congressional office buildings (they are behind the capitol in the Capitol Hill neighborhood), each with a small line of people waiting to go through metal detectors to go in and get Inauguration tickets, which are handed out by members of Congress to constituents.

I got our tickets, basically, by calling Rep. Dingell’s office nearly every day since November and e-mailing regularly. It paid off in that, when we walked in the door, two aides welcomed us with, “You must be Laura Sky Brown and her son Henry,” and they walked us in to Rep. Dingell’s office and let us sit in his chairs. 

I interrogated an aide, Derek Dobies, hoping Henry would find his story interesting and perhaps inspiring: 2008 graduate from MSU in political theory, worked on the Dingell campaign and managed it in East Lansing. Took his picture in Rep. Dingell’s office.

We also saw the health care reform gavel (I touched it) and Rep. Dingell’s motorized scooter in the corner of the office. I was interested to see that his desk was covered with papers. Unfortunately he was not in the offices at the time.

Along with the tickets, which admit us to the Yellow zone for the ceremony, we were handed an over-the-top large engraved commemorative invitation to the ceremony with gold braid on it, and mechanically signed photos of the President and VP.  Planning to frame the invitation.

20 January (Lincoln Memorial): Henry’s one unmissable sight for today was to go pay a visit to the Lincoln Second Inaugural speech, which is carved into the wall up at the Lincoln Memorial. The walk took about 90 minutes among large crowds, and it was totally worth the walk to stand under the famous lines as well as to see the statue again.

“Let us strive on to finish the work we are in … “

20 January (Union Station):  Getting back to Union Station at the end of the day was a challenge involving walking, a taxi, running, the subway system, and more running, as the streets were being closed off one by one all around the Capitol just as we reached them. We made the last train of the day as it was starting to pull out of the station.

We are taking the commuter train back in this morning (Monday) from Harpers Ferry West Virginia, where we’re staying with friends. It doesn’t arrive at Union Station until 9:15 a.m. by which time the crowds should be peaking.

We are anticipating the same major difficulty getting where we want to be for the inaugural ceremony as we had four years ago.

Will keep you posted as the day goes on!

21 January early morning (Union Station): The crowds begin.

Crowds in Union Station

Obama bags for $5

Demonstrator in Washington D.C. on Jan. 21, 2013

Crowds are fraction of what they were four years ago. Can move! And text!

Four years ago this tunnel was a teeming mass of humanity and we were scared of being trapped and turned back! Today nobody walking through at all and street above almost walkable.

Long but friendly line to go through security.

21 January 10:10 a.m. (Security Checkpoint): Big crowd but nobody pushing. In sight of entry gates but too close and dark for photo.

21 January 10:29 a.m. (Security Checkpoint): Gate temporarily closed for crowd control; we are very close to getting through.

Getting through security.

21 January 11:29 a.m. (Mall): We are on left as we face the Capitol. Weather cool but pleasant. Crowd cheerful and we can hear though not see below the dome from here . People have climbed nearby trees. Henry wanted to but I nixed idea. Chuck Schumer speaking. Crowd goes wild when he says name of Barack Obama.

People around us in crowd posing for pictures holding their tickets while Sen. Schumer speaks

Laura Sky Brown, Jan. 21, 2013 presidential inauguration ceremony. Hearing Hail to the Chief we are really up close! Boehner is announced to boos from all around us, Obama to cheers.

21 January 11:50 a.m. (Mall): Biden sworn in. We can sort of see even. James Taylor singing America the Beautiful.

21 January 11:52 a.m. (Mall): Here comes presidential oath. Hush over crowd.

21 January 11:54 a.m. (Mall): Crowd chanting O-ba-ma! O-ba-ma!

Crowd cheers Obama taking oath.

Listening to Barack Obama’s inaugural address on Jan. 21, 2013. “Our journey is not complete until all our children, from the streets of Detroit to the hills of Appalachia to the quiet lanes of Newtown, know that they are cared for, and cherished, and always safe from harm. That is our generation’s task – to make these words, these rights, these values – of Life, and Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness – real for every American.”

A transcript of President Obama’s full inaugural address is posted on the White House website.

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