Sotomayor's Nomination: 'Estoy en Shock'!

My email in-box could barely keep up with all the excitement over Sonia Sotomayor's nomination. It brimmed with exclamation points, capital letters and emotions expressed in English, Spanish and Spanglish:

"W0W...Estoy en shock!!!! Increible!!!!! Que felicidad!!!!"

"WHAT AN INCREDIBLE MOMENT IN OUR LIFETIME!!!! I AM SO HAPPY!!!!"

Plans for a celebration, and cucumber martinis, were immediately afoot. Most of the reaction came from my Latina group in NYC, a collection of career women in law, politics, media and the arts. Most of us have met Sotomayor -- some know her well -- and many in the group share with her a background of humble beginnings and impressive accomplishment.

But it was the daughters of Puerto Rican parents in New York that I was the most interested in hearing from after today's announcement. Unlike me -- Puerto Rican, born and raised in Puerto Rico, who came to the states as a college student -- these women knew what it was like to grow up Latina when being Latina was not hip. They are familiar with Judge Sotomayor's history and qualifications, so whether she's up to the job was not a topic of discussion. No one talked about her as a liberal. Nor did anyone separate her womanhood from her Latina-ness (grrrrr.)

No, the reaction was purely personal, despite the politics at stake. "I relate so much to her," said my good friend Edna Negrón, an associate professor of journalism at Ramapo College of New Jersey. "We grew up in the same New York, same era, facing similar challenges. Obama's selection is an exhilarating reaffirmation that we are in a new 'yes we can' America."

Rossana Rosado, publisher & CEO of El Diario La Prensa, said: "What a day indeed. As a Puerto Rican born and raised in the Bronx I am immensely proud and uplifted by President Obama's selection of Judge Sonia Sotomayor because it changes the landscape for the boys and girls of the Bronx and allows them to believe that they can achieve great things. Her story and that of her family is an experience shared by many in our neighborhood, and her historic nomination inspires us to forge ahead."

Another friend, a lawyer, said: "What is important to understand is just how far the road is from the South Bronx, the poorest congressional district in the nation, to graduating summa cum laude at an institution filled with children who had access to private tutors and all the assistance money can buy."

My lawyer friend's job wouldn't allow her to speak on the record, but she was outspoken on another point: It was no coincidence that Sotomayor, raised in New York City by a single mother, got her launching pad in Catholic school.

The prevalence of Catholics on the Supreme Court has troubled some commentators, but my women's group is too diverse to see that as a problem. All of us were raised Catholic but the group's conflicted views on Catholicism came to the fore recently when one of the women asked for views on whether she should enroll her daughter in Catholic school. The reaction was as homogeneous -- Don't do it! Go for it! Yes! No! -- as the lesbians, divorcees, nun-phobics and church-going in our bunch. But my lawyer friend made a convincing argument for enrollment:

"There would be no black and Latino middle class as we know it but for the existence of Catholic schools in inner-city communities," she said. "What the Catholic schools in inner-city communities provided then and provide today is educational opportunity in places where academic success is not easy to come by."

Overcoming the odds, being recognized and given awesome responsibilities, experiencing the reality of a changing nation --- those were the chords struck by the nomination of Sotomayor in this one circle of friends. I can only imagine the conversations in housing projects across the country, at Princeton and other colleges, among the Sotomayors in both Puerto Rico and the Bronx, and among the Riveras, and the Marcanos, and the Navarros, and the....

When I was young, I was inspired by Woodward and Bernstein and what journalists could achieve. Had I been 18 when Sotomayor stood next to the president...who knows where that would have led me. I'd like to think that I'd bring the same perspective to the table no matter my chosen path.

So, my friends celebrate while I write this post (I'm holding out for the cucumber martinis.) A call for an immediate gabfest Tuesday night, with BYOB and take-out, went out within hours of Obama's announcement. It came from a group member who had spent her day ailing with a bad cold but who, on this historic day, suddenly could not lie still.