This past weekend, while the rest of us were hungover or watching The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt or…

“Oh my Jesus,” Ryan said. And for good reason. On the other side of that bridge were the people. People as far as you could see — as far as people could be. The moment was breathtaking — for the first time all day, no one was talking. For a few seconds, all you could do was look out and think about what happened on this bridge; consider the significance of the speeches that would be taking place in front of this bridge, and who would be making those speeches; pause to think about what it means that Congressman John Lewis would again introduce Barack Obama in Selma, only instead of in a church, this time it would be just feet from where he was attacked and his skull was fractured 50 years prior.

This past weekend, while the rest of us were hungover or watching The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt or hungover and watching The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, Hairpin pal Rembert Browne flew to Selma with President Obama. He doesn’t understate the appeal of being so close to the leader of the free world (“I’d long thought my twenties would be defined by getting sonned by the president.” COOL STORY REMBERT), but doesn’t lose sight of why he’s there — -the 50th anniversary of the Selma marches — -and the pain of it all.