At 9:50 p.m., Memphis mayoral candidate Paul Young bounded onto the stage at Minglewood Hall, took the microphone and began to address the crowd. He didn’t use any notes. He just opened up and talked.

He talked about the heaviness that the city has been feeling. He talked about the extraordinary challenges that lie ahead.

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He talked about the cries of the mothers, the cousins, the brothers. He talked about the decades of crushing poverty.

But he talked about the possibilities, too. He talked about his belief in Memphis and Memphians.

And listening to that speech Thursday night, even the most hard-hearted citizen might have felt at least a hint of something that has been missing around here for a long time.

Optimism.

No, really.

Actual hope.

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“This is not a me thing,” he said. “This is not about Paul Young. This is about the future of our city, the city that we love, the city that people forgot about, the one that they want to write off. We’re not having it, y’all. We’re ready to take us into a new future.”

Can I get an Amen?

Or maybe not, given the circumstances. Lingering skepticism is acceptable. Young was elected mayor of Memphis with fewer than 25,000 votes. That’s fewer votes than any Memphis mayor since the current form of government began in 1967. The previous low was during the election of 2015, when Jim Strickland won with 42,020 votes, according to Shelby County Election Commission data.

It’s a preposterous system we have and it gave us a preposterous field. There were 17 candidates, which is five more candidates than are competing in Alaska’s Fat Bear Week. So the mayoral debates were debates in name only. Nobody really stood out.

Floyd Bonner was the guy with the badge and that’s about all most Memphians knew. Willie Herenton was the 83-year-old former mayor who was somehow, incredibly, back to run again. Van Turner was the one who kept calling himself the Democrat (in a field of Democrats). And then there was Young, who had never run for anything before.

Small wonder the turnout on Election Day wasn’t so hot. Also — for the first time in weeks! — it rained.

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So there weren’t any real lines at the polling sites. It was dispiriting. Where was all the passion we witnessed during the power outages earlier in the year? Where was all the passion we see on the NextDoor app every single day?

But there were hopeful moments. Krystal Taylor arrived to vote at the Whitehaven Community Center with Tevin, her 6-year-old son.

“He noticed all the signs when we were driving around and asked me what they were,” Taylor said. “I told him they were about voting. He asked me, ‘Can we go vote?’”

As Taylor explained this, a car backfired.

“Fireworks,” young Tevin promptly whispered, to himself.

“I tell him that all the noises are fireworks,” Taylor said. “He would be terrified to know most of them are guns.”

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As it happens, Taylor teaches 2- and 3-year-olds. She routinely sees them act out the violence they see in the neighborhood.

“But I have hope,” she said. “I really do. We need a mayor who wants to cut down on the violence, of course, but who understands that, to do that long-term, we have to reach the kids.”

There’s no way to know for certain if Young can do all that. It is a daunting job he just won. But I offer the following reasons that Young just might be the right guy for the job.

He’s energetic: A year ago, when he launched his campaign, Young had essentially no name recognition. But he started to do a series of community meet-and-greets that were, quite explicitly, not fundraisers. Those meet-and-greets led to more meet-and-greets. Which led to more meet-and-greets. Folks started giving money even if they weren’t asked. Young ended up raising more money than any other candidate — and almost certainly shook more hands than any of the other leading candidates. The guy will not be outworked.

He’s positive: You didn’t hear any attack ads coming from Young. That couldn’t have been easy, given how frequently Young was attacked. Indeed, some of Young’s supporters told me exactly what sort of attacks they wished he had launched during the campaign. Young wasn’t having it.

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That’s a good thing, isn’t it? Especially given the finger-pointing we’ve endured?

“We need a mayor who speaks with a unifying voice,” Young said.

Can’t we all unite behind that?

His vision for Memphis is larger than crime: Of course Young wants to reduce crime. Just like every mayoral candidate. You’d have to be a moron not to understand that we are in the midst of a civic crime crisis. But Young’s message is bigger than crime. I refer you, again, to the speech.

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“We can see a future when our city is on the top of all the best-of lists again,” he said. “We can see a time when the Memphis streets are clean and our citizens are prospering and they’re safe, when we’re growing wealth in Black and brown communities. We can see a united Memphis where all of our neighborhoods are supported and pride is renewed.”

That’s a vision that Memphians should be able to get behind. And you’ll note it includes the word “safe.” But it doesn’t begin and end with that word. It is bigger — and richer — than that.

Young is, well, young: Young walked to the ballot box Thursday morning with his young son. He’s a Dad. He likes hip-hop. He turns 44 this Saturday. In order to get his kids to embrace the campaign, he promised them a dog when it was done.

It’s not that Herenton (83) or Bonner (64) couldn’t have done the job at their ages. But who is better suited to sell the image of a new, vibrant Memphis? The two grandfathers or the young Dad who likes hip-hop?

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And, yes, it is possible that all this is a little too optimistic. But isn’t a little optimism what we need these days?

Along with energy. And competence. And vision. And a dog.

OK, maybe the dog isn’t mandatory. But I am happy one is on the way. Because it shows the new mayor has the ability to compromise. And there will surely be days when he needs a friend.