When I told my Navy dad that I had been invited to have a one-on-one interview with Michelle Obama when she was in Norfolk, Va., participating in a roundtable discussion with other military spouses last week, Dad chewed aggressively on a toothpick in his mouth.

Dad is a Republican. Most people in my family are Republicans. The idea that someone would choose not to put their hand over their heart during the National Anthem, as Sen. Barack Obama has allegedly done, makes them nervous. No, angry.

But my job as a member of the media is to listen with an open mind. So I attended the event in Norfolk not as a Republican or a Democrat. I went as a military spouse, and to be the eyes and ears of voters like me who will read this column.

As the auditorium at Old Dominion University swarmed with reporters, Secret Service, and Obama '08 campaign volunteers, I instantly picked out the military wives who had been selected (yes, selected) for the roundtable discussion with Mrs. Obama. Unlike media savvy counterparts to my right and left, who over the years have become so accustomed, and perhaps jaded, to events such as this, the military wives had hopeful, eager expressions. Oh, and some of them had their servicemembers with them, too. I can spot a military haircut a mile away.

I suspected that nothing especially newsworthy would come out of the event, given that the panel of military wives had been carefully vetted and hand-picked, but as I watched them take their seats on stage, a new worry came to mind. My fellow military-spouse sisters might fall victim to being pawns in a political debate. Let's be honest, military life isn't easy. There is much to complain about. In the same way that relatives might vent about annoyances unique to their shared family, military spouses often complain to each other about long lines at the military pharmacy, moving every two to three years, and raising children alone during deployments. I've complained about many of these things in this column. But I don't usually expect a solution. Is there a solution to the inconvenience of moving every two to three years? Not if we are to put the needs of the military and our country's defense ahead of our own, and that's something military spouses are incredibly adept at.

Indeed, some of the wives on the panel did use the platform to voice concerns about inevitable and largely unfixable aspects of military life — moving children to new schools every couple of years, etc. — and I was disappointed in how many observers in the room seemed to place the fault of these problems squarely on the Bush Administration, as if military life hasn't been this way since the beginning of military life. I feared that military spouses in the audience and on stage were being led to believe that the military lifestyle will be a breeze if Barack Obama is president.

Then the main spokeswoman for the spouse group stood up to introduce herself. She was well-spoken, poised, and intelligent, like so many other military spouses I know. I wanted to stand up and cheer for the fantastic representation she was. She stuck to problems with real solutions: protecting military-spouse jobs, streamlining military health care, and bringing military pay into the 21st Century.

Many of the spokeswoman's concerns were addressed in a printed pamphlet paid for and handed out by the Obama campaign titled, "Barack Obama's Plan to Support Virginia Military Families." In it, Obama outlines his plan to make life better for military families. He will, in part, "create a military families advisory board"; institute paid support staff for the already voluntary network of spouses supporting spouses with child care and counseling; fix the military-civilian pay gap, which is estimated to be from 7 percent -15 percent; end stop loss; make deployment schedules more predictable; improve care and mental health treatment for wounded warriors and their families.

When I shared this list with another military spouse, her immediate response was, "Can I have a pony, too?"

After the roundtable discussion, I was invited back for a private one-on-one talk with Mrs. Obama. I worried about how I would connect with her, given the disparity between our politics. So I wasn't necessarily surprised when I connected with Mrs. Obama — a warm, friendly, personable human being who seemed like everyone's favorite neighbor or best-girlfriend who tells it to you straight, on a totally different level — as a working woman and mother, and the wife of someone who has committed their life to service.

My interview of Mrs. Obama, plus exclusive photos, will be published in its entirety in the October 2008 issue of Military Spouse magazine.