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her the same kind of clear-eyed perspective I saw in Barack. Barack had concerns
about my working at city hall. Like Valerie, he’d been inspired by the leadership
of Harold Washington when he was mayor, but felt decidedly less affinity for the
old-school establishment represented by Richard M. Daley. It was the
community organizer in him: Even while Washington was in office, he’d had to
battle relentlessly and sometimes fruitlessly with the city in order to get even the
smallest bit of support for grassroots projects. Though he’d been nothing but
encouraging about my job prospects, I think he was quietly worried I might end
up disillusioned or disempowered working under Daley.

Valerie was the right person to address any concerns. She’d rearranged her
entire life in order to work for Washington and then lost him almost
immediately. The void that followed Washington’s death offered a kind of
cautionary tale for the future, one I’d eventually find myself trying to explain to
people across America: In Chicago, we’d made the mistake of putting all our
hopes for reform on the shoulders of one person without building the political
apparatus to support his vision. Voters, especially liberal and black voters, viewed
Washington as a kind of golden savior, a symbol, the man who could change
everything. He’d carried the load admirably, inspiring people like Barack and
Valerie to move out of the private sector and into community work and public
service. But when Harold Washington died, most of the energy he’d generated
did, too.

Valerie’s decision to stay on with the mayor’s office had required some
thought, but she explained to us why she felt it was the right choice. She
described feeling supported by Daley and knowing that she was being useful to
the city. Her loyalty, she said, had been to Harold Washington’s principles more
than to the man himself. Inspiration on its own was shallow; you had to back it
up with hard work. This idea resonated with both me and Barack, and inside that
one dinner I felt as if something had been cemented: Valerie Jarrett was now a
part of our lives. Without our ever discussing it, it seemed almost as if the three
of us had somehow agreed to carry one another a good long way.

here was one last thing to do, now that we were engaged, now that I’d
taken a new job and Barack had made a commitment to Davis, Miner, Barnhill &
Galland, the public interest law firm that had been courting him: We took a
vacation, or maybe more accurately we went on a sort of pilgrimage. We flew