WASHINGTON — Michelle Obama won’t give herself a grade for her inaugural year in the White House, but she is pleased with her debut and promises there’s more ahead.
“I’m a 110-percenter,” she said Wednesday, “and, yes, we can do more.”
Nothing – not an episode, an event or an outfit – would merit a “redo,” she told reporters in answer to question.
Not even last year’s infamous gate-crashers? “The state dinner was an outstanding success,” she judged, dismissing the three uninvited guests at the Nov. 24 gala for India’s prime minister as a “footnote.”
Obama, who turns 46 on Sunday, spoke from the White House a week out from the first anniversary of her husband’s inauguration. In an hourlong interview with seven reporters, she recapped a year with visits to 14 states, eight foreign countries and six military bases and with 200-plus events at the White House.
She touted her beloved garden, saying it had produced 1,000 pounds of food, as well as the White House bees, which were credited with 100 pounds of honey.
The first lady said, though, that she was most pleased by getting Malia, 11, and Sasha, 8, settled. “I was just really worried about these little girls and whether they’d feel good starting this new school and living this new life,” she recalled.
Only in March could she breathe a sigh of relief, when the girls came home from school and said: “Mom, this is OK. This feels like home.”
The first lady touched on a range of subjects including promoting ChicagoChicago reviews
’s unsuccessful bid for the Olympics (she doesn’t regret it), her husband’s new job (he’s never worked harder) and their daughters (she’s happy “they’re sane” – the same kids they were before – and hopes she can say the same in three years).
She also talked about her top causes – healthy eating, mentoring, promoting volunteerism and supporting military families – and promised to be front-and-center soon when the administration unveils a major initiative to fight childhood obesity.
When talking about the president, she referred to him simply as “Barack.” She confessed she tries to stay grounded by thinking of herself as “Michelle” – not the first lady. “I think I am a better first lady when I’m Michelle,” she said, “than when I’m somebody else that is in a magazine.”
She added that she checks in with friends from time to time, asking: “Do you still recognize me? When we sit down … do I still feel like Michelle, or are you tripping?”
When asked why she doesn’t portray her marriage as perfect, she said relationships and marriage are never easy and that she doesn’t want young people to quit – whether it’s in a marriage or a sport or a career – because they’ve hit a bump.
Mrs. Obama wore her hair in a slightly shorter bob and chose a rust-colored dress, and brown, suede, over-the-knee Jimmy Choo boots for the session. The fancy footwear notwithstanding, don’t plan to see her in Chicago this month. “It’s winter, and we’re not going in January,” she said. And you haven’t seen her there lately – in the last 12 months, she visited only last Valentine’s Day weekend – because, as she tells it, the girls’ weekend schedules are filled with ballet recitals, soccer matches, basketball games and sleepovers.
Her journeys of late have been far-flung. She named as among the year’s most memorable watching her daughters meet the pope, joining with the girls for tea with Queen Elizabeth II and visiting a slave-trade site in Ghana.
For her birthday Sunday, she’s likely to be closer to home. “I might go out to dinner with my husband, but I don’t know yet. I haven’t been invited.”
On political subjects, she said it was unclear how much campaigning she would do before the midterm elections, was mum when questioned about Sarah Palin and answered “absolutely not” when asked if she would ever run for office.
On Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who recently apologized for having said in the past that Barack Obama was an appealing candidate because he was light-skinned and didn’t speak with a “Negro dialect,” she said she measures people more on what they do, not what they say.
When asked if in light of his comments there needed to be a national conversation on race, she pointed out that her great-great-great-grandmother was a slave and that the civil rights movement had occurred in her lifetime, meaning misperceptions persist and conversation should continue.
“None of us should be complacent in believing that just because we have a black president that everything is going to be fixed,” she said.
On whether she shared the concern of women worried that a health care reform bill would restrict their right to an abortion, she said she wasn’t clear on the details of the legislation and added: “Obviously, I believe that a woman’s right to choose is critical.”
She spoke from an elegant, high-ceilinged, yellow room known as the Old Family Dining Room, marked by portraits of two predecessors: Edith Roosevelt and Frances Cleveland. “History is clear every day we wake up and get on that elevator and walk down to the East and West Wing,” she noted.
She said she was proud to be the nation’s first African-American first lady, adding: “My goal is to make sure that I’m representing the entire country and doing myself and my family and my community a service as I do it.”
–Katherine Skiba
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