By A.J. Llewellyn

I had an amazing experience last night…my best friends Chris and Tracy had been trying to reach me for a couple of days to invite me to a concert my god daughter Eleanna was participating in. A severe cold kept me huddled over soup and book rewrites, but finally last night, they arrived at my door and dragged me down the street.

“Oh no,” I groaned to myself. “Another bloody school recital!”

We pulled up at the Hand Car Wash in Studio City. Admittedly, it’s a cool car wash with a big corvette spinning at the top, but still, it’s a car wash.

What I didn’t know: this was a concert for President-elect Obama and the atmosphere was electric. I was surprised how cool the whole thing was with a stage and about 300 people in their seats. I’m sorry for the rest of the country but Los Angeles is experiencing the most gorgeous weather on record – literally – and it was like a balmy summer evening as parents turned up in tuxedos and big smiles for the beginning of an historic chapter in the lives of our country’s children.

There were many local celebrities – I spotted singer Macy Gray with her children – but since I was sitting at the front I couldn’t keep turning around to play Spot-the-Celeb without embarrassing myself. The concert itself was stunning and my Eleanna brought down the house singing Cat in the Hat and selections from Annie with her classmates.  It was a wonderful show with no shortage of talent and good will.

When it was all over, people were bubbling with the new change we’re about to experience. All of us affected by the Writer’s Guild strike exactly a year ago, voiced hope for a peaceful resolution to the Screen Actors’ Guild negotiations. We spoke with hope of an end to the recession, of war, of the health insurance crisis.

I asked a few of the kids how they felt about our new President and what it all meant to them. One boy, around 10, shrugged.

“I can’t believe how political my school has become over this,” he said, shocking me. “I have to watch his inauguration during my history class.”

“This isn’t politics,” I said to him, as his father hovered. “It’s history.”

“I’m afraid,” his father said with an embarrassed laugh, “he’s getting his views from me. I’m the lone Republican in a sea of Democrats here.”

I was so stunned how much anger his little boy had, how he was repeating the crap, sorry, but it was, that his father had told him. I almost incited a riot just asking a simple question.

A lot of parents spoke up, agreeing with me that “making” the kids watch the inauguration was not political, but historical.

I remembered being in school in Australia and how the entire country stopped to watch Prince Charles and Lady Diana’s wedding. I said it was something I would never forget.

We all took turns talking about where we were when Kennedy died, when the moon landing happened, when Princess Diana died…and then my Eleanna piped up.

“I am so excited to have a new President,” she said. “I believe President Obama when he says he wants to bring peace and he wants to bring change. I think our country needs peace.”

Out of the mouths of babes…who was it who said that children would lead the way?

And that led of course to all of us talking about John Lennon and how much he would have loved Obama. And I wondered last night in that car wash in the glamorous city of film studios if finally, just finally, we’re heeding his call and Obama’s Children are the ones who will give power to Lennon’s words, Give peace a chance.

Aloha oe,

A.J.