Like many people, I cried more than once today.

I cried so much, that I can’t remember everything that caused me to tear up.

I cried when I watched the videos of the women who sang “Amazing Grace” and “Hallelujah” at yesterday’s memorial for those who’ve died from COVID. I choked up when I saw President-elect Biden walking through the halls and taking the stage and when the female firefighter spoke and signed the Pledge of Allegiance.

While I was puzzled and bemused by Lady Gaga’s outfit, her rendition of the Star Spangled Banner moved me to tears. Of course, I cried when I watched Sonia Sotomayor swear in Kamala Harris. Jennifer Lopez’s performance, particularly when she spoke in Spanish, got to me. And then, as Joe Biden took the oath, a flood of emotion again overwhelmed me. (I don’t think I cried during Amanda Gorman’s amazing poem; I just sat their amazed.)

I had a hunch I would be teary. But I didn’t know how much I have been holding in and I wasn’t prepared for its release.

Later, I wondered how I could do justice to all of this in my #stampoftheday post. could do justice to all this emotion. When the day started, I thought I was going to connect the inauguration with a stamp issued on January 20, 1960 that says, “Observe good faith and justice towards all nations.” The line is from the speech that George Washington gave when he left office in 1796. The stamp was the first in a series of “American Credo” stamps featuring famous statements by famous Americans.

While that seemed like promising material, there was one small problem. I assumed the stamp was in my late father’s collection. But, as my father loved to say, “Goliath was killed by an assumption.”

So I went back to the drawing board to see if he had another stamp that was issued on, portrayed (or was connected with) an event that occurred on, or pictured a person who was born or died on January 20. I struck out again.

But I also realized that I didn’t want to use just any stamp on this momentous day. So I decided to change the process and see if I could find a stamp that expressed some of what I’ve been feeling today. I found a 3-cent stamp picturing the Boulder Dam that was issued on September 30, 1935, the day that President Franklin D. Roosevelt presided over dedication ceremony for the dam (which we now know as the Hoover Dam). The dam – which rises 726 feet above bedrock and created a 115-mile long lake – wasn’t actually done but Roosevelt was passing through the area. More than 10,000 people turned out in 102-degree weather for the event.

I picked this stamp because it really does feel like a dam broke today, or at least the sluice gates were opened and let out something that has been held back for four years.

I also picked the stamp because the dam is an example of what government can accomplish. I had thought it was result of Roosevelt’s New Deal initiatives. But, in fact, work on the dam had started in 1931, almost two years before Roosevelt took office. That, in turn, suggests that the dam had bipartisan support, something that is going to be badly needed in the coming weeks and months.

And finally, I like the connection with Roosevelt, who, like Biden, took office in the midst of a national crisis. Moreover, like Biden, many seemingly sanguine people initially dismissed Roosevelt. Walter Lippman, one of the era’s leading political analysts, for example, famously observed that Roosevelt, “is a pleasant man who, without any important qualifications for the office, would very much like to be president.”

But Roosevelt rose to the occasion, starting with his first inaugural address, which was given on March 4, 1933, in the midst of an economic crisis. Like Biden, he promised to speak truthfully. “This,” he said in the speech’s first minute, “is preeminently the time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly.” He continued by emphasizing that we should not “shrink from honestly facing conditions in our country today.” But, he promised, “This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper.”

And then he delivered some of the most famous lines ever spoken in a presidential address, saying, “let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself–nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.”

Roosevelt went on to contend that “in every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor” had, with the support of people, met the challenges of their time. He laid out the challenges and his proposals to address them. And then, in words that could have been said today, he said, “we do not distrust the future of essential democracy. The people of the United States have not failed. In their need, they have registered a mandate that they want direct, vigorous action….They have made me the present instrument of their wishes. In the spirit of the gift I take it.”

I don’t know if people cried during Roosevelt’s inauguration. I do know that Great Depression didn’t end after Roosevelt spoke these words. But, we’re told, public sentiment did shift in important ways not only because of what the president said and how he said it but also because Roosevelt and the extraordinary team backed up those words with vigorous action.

I cried today because even in what Biden called “this winter of peril and possibility,” I heard words and have seen actions that give me hope that our leaders are going to forthrightly and our government is going to effectively address this moment’s many simultaneous crises.

If they do, this great Nation will again endure, revive and prosper.”

Be well, stay safe, speak the truth “frankly and boldly,” fight for justice, and work for peace.