By LARRY BALLWAHN | Wilton
Michelle Robinson grew up on the southside of Chicago in the late ‘60s and the ‘70s. Most of her youth was spent in the middle-class neighborhood of South Shore, in a brick house owned by her Great-Aunt Robbie. Michelle’s family rented an apartment on the second floor. Much of her extended family lived in the area. Her father tended to boilers in one of Chicago’s water-filtration plants, and her mother stayed home to raise Michelle and her brother Craig. The neighborhood was racially mixed when she was young but became steadily blacker.
It was made clear to the Robinson children that the reason they were not going to buy a house was that their parents expected them to do well and intended to be in a position to support whatever achievements were to come. Michelle was a good student, dated and did the things young people do. She felt that her way in school was made easier by an older brother who was well liked, a high achiever and a skilled basketball player. Craig received a basketball scholarship to Princeton, and Michelle chose Princeton in part because he was there.
Following graduation from Princeton, Michelle attended Harvard Law School, and upon graduation, joined the law firm Sidley & Austin in Chicago. Not long after she had proved her worth at Sidley and Austin, she was asked to mentor a young law student, Barack Obama. The mentorship meant that the two spent a good deal of time together. Eventually that led to dating and that led to romance. Barack had two years of law school left.
Barack Hussein Obama had a white mother and a black father. He had been raised in Hawaii by his grandparents. He was a dedicated reader and thinker with a sense of purpose. Michelle was discovering that even though she had checked all the boxes, she was not satisfied to work in a large law firm. She accepted a lower paying job with the city, the first of several jobs that she would have that involved connecting people and neighborhoods with governments or institutions.
The couple married in 1992. Michelle was employed as an organizer of Public Allies, a nonprofit that was developing leadership in deserving youth. Barack was writing a book, “Dreams from My Father,” working for a law firm and teaching a class at the University of Chicago Law School. As Michelle continued her search for a meaningful career, Barack sought a bigger stage. As she would do several more times, Michelle reluctantly gave her blessing to Barack’s political ambition. In 1996, Barack ran for the Illinois Senate and won. “This won’t be news to anyone, but my husband did become a politician. He was a good person who wanted to have an impact in this world, and despite my skepticism he decided this was the best way to go about it. Such is the nature of his faith.”
The Obamas have two girls, and Michelle is a devoted mother. She has supported Barack’s career while charting a path of her own, including during eight years as the First Lady of the United States. In that role, she was a champion for child nutrition, women and girls.
“Becoming” is a very personal book. From her early family life, her relationships, to her challenges of being a politician’s wife, Michelle Obama, has written an insightful book. Reading or rereading it will provide a good perspective for the challenge of Barack Obama’s new release, “A Promised Land.”
