Dutch with the First Lady.
Barack and I developed a special fondness for Queen Elizabeth, who reminded Barack of his no-nonsense grandmother. Over the course of many visits she showed me that humanity is more important than protocol or formality.
Meeting Nelson Mandela gave me the perspective I needed a couple of years into our White House journey—that real change happens slowly, not just over months and years but over decades and lifetimes.
A hug, for me, is a way to melt away pretenses and simply connect. Here I’m at Oxford University with the girls from London’s Elizabeth Garrett Anderson School.
I’ll never forget the spirit of optimism and resilience that lived in the service members and military families I met during visits to Walter Reed Medical Center.
Hadiya Pendleton’s mother, Cleopatra Cowley-Pendleton, did everything right but still couldn’t protect her child from the awful randomness of gun violence. Meeting her before Hadiya’s funeral in Chicago, I was overwhelmed by how unfair it was.
I tried as often as possible to be home to greet the girls when they came back from school. It was one benefit of living above the office.
Barack always maintained a healthy separation between work and family time, making it upstairs for dinner nearly every night and managing to be fully present with us at home. In 2009, the girls and I broke down the barrier and surprised him in the Oval Office on his birthday.
We made good on our promise to Malia and Sasha that if Barack became president, we’d get a dog. In fact, we eventually got two. Bo (pictured here) and Sunny brought a sense of lightness to everything.
Each spring I hoped to use my commencement speeches to inspire graduates and help them see the power of their own stories. Here I am preparing to speak at Virginia Tech in 2012. In the background, Tina Tchen, my tireless chief of staff for five years, can be seen as she often was: multitasking on her phone.
The dogs were free to roam throughout much of the White House. They especially loved hanging out in the garden and also in the kitchen. Here they are in the pantry with butler Jorge Davila, probably hoping to get slipped some food.
We’re deeply grateful to all of the staff who kept our lives running smoothly for eight years. We came to know about their kids and grandkids and also celebrated milestones with them, as we did here with assistant usher Reggie Dixon on his birthday in 2012.
Being the First Family came with unusual privileges and some unusual challenges. Barack and I sought to maintain a sense of normalcy for our girls. ABOVE LEFT: Malia, Barack, and I cheer on Sasha’s basketball team, the Vipers. ABOVE RIGHT: The girls relax on Bright Star, the call sign for the First Lady’s plane.
We made sure our girls had the opportunity to do standard teenage things, like learning to drive a car, even if it meant having driving lessons with the Secret Service.
The Fourth of July always gives us a lot to celebrate, since it’s also Malia’s birthday.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned in life, it’s the power of using your voice. I tried my best to speak the truth and shed light on the stories of people whoare often brushed aside.
In 2015, my family joined Congressman John Lewis and other icons of the civil rights movement in commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, Alabama. I was reminded that day of how far our country has come—and how far we still have to go.
17
When I was in first grade, a boy in my class punched me in the face one day, his fist coming like a comet, full force and out of nowhere. We’d been lining up to go to lunch, all of us discussing whatever felt urgent just then to six- and seven-year-olds—who was the fastest runner or why crayon colors had such weird names—when blam, I got whacked. I don’t know why. I’ve forgotten the boy’s name, but I remember staring at him dumbfounded and in pain, my lower lip already swelling, my eyes hot with tears. Too shocked to be angry, I ran home to my mom.
The boy got a talking-to from our teacher. My mother went over to school to personally lay eyes