Michelle Obama: Many 'Didn't Think They'd Live to See the Day'

Barack Obama's wife tells Charles Gibson she's waiting to hear his speech live.

Aug. 28, 2008— -- When Sen. Barack Obama formally accepts the Democratic nomination at Invesco Field stadium in front of 80,000 people, Michelle Obama will be in the crowd, listening to her husband's speech for the first time.

"I like to feel the same thing that everyone else is going to in this stadium," she told ABC News' Charlie Gibson today at Invesco Field. "He also started to tell me how the ending was going to go, and I stopped him again. I said, 'I don't want to know. I want to feel it tonight.'"

"I think tonight we'll have a chance to step back and breathe in and take it in and think about what this means for the country now, and what it'll mean for our kids in the future," she said.

Watch the interview on "World News" at 6:30 p.m. ET and watch Gibson, Diane Sawyer and George Stephanopoulos at the Democratic convention tonight at 10 ET on ABC.

Obama, the first black major party presidential candidate, addresses the nation on the 45th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech.

It "is pretty powerful, even for someone like me and Barack who are so busy doing it, that sometimes you don't get a chance to, to step back," she said.

"There were so many people who didn't think they'd live to see the day," she said. "So many people of a variety of backgrounds who remembered that speech were there, and fought the fights, and had the hopes and dreams for the next generation. And to see it materialize in some small way, through this process, I think moves the nation, no matter who you're supporting."

Despite the magnitude of this milestone, Gibson noted how there has been little mention of race at the Denver convention.

"I think that the issues that are affecting the country really transcend race and gender and age," the potential first lady said. "When someone is struggling to pay to put gas in their car, when a person has lost their job, and doesn't have health care, and they're worried about their kids' college education, those problems know no racial boundaries."

'Just Like Any Couple'

When asked to what extent her husband consulted with her on his choice for vice president, she said, "We talked about how he was thinking about it. … But we probably do what most couples do. The first thing we talk about is our kids, how they're doing."

And even though she plays devil's advocate from time to time, she said, "I trust Barack's judgment implicitly. I say this all the time, in the 20 years I've known him, Barack hasn't disappointed me. I stopped completely questioning everything he does."

Before they were married, she said the two were engaged in "intense debates about, how do you make change."

But she added that she thought her husband was "too smart to go into politics."

"I always tried to talk him out of it. But he always talked me into it," she said with a laugh.

But as her husband prepares to accept his party's nomination, Michelle Obama doesn't need further convincing.

"I am proud, so proud, of what he's accomplished, and I'm glad that I didn't stand in the way."