Tag Archives: america

the fourth of july

Posted by —

1

I love the 4th of July. I always have, and I always will. I love the festivity of it, the fact that we celebrate something that is both monumental and fundamental; that we have a holiday to remind us to not take for granted that which once we were denied; that Americans are the sort of dreamy, cheesy people who will wave flags and cheer in the bleakest of years, when the dream seems to be no more than a memory. Nothing could have prepared me for the absolute delight, though, that is the Boston 4th of July. I am truly amazed.

Because I’m heading to London tonight, I won’t be able to attend the actual Boston 4th celebration, but they held a “dress rehearsal” last night that was open to the public, and a friend and I went. Truly magnificent: the Boston POPS, along with Toby Keith, the Tanglewood choir, Middlesex Fife and Drum Volunteers, and easily over a thousand enthusiastic members of the audience. It was truly inspiring. Since it was the Boston POPS, the music was phenomenal of course, and the spirit of patriotism was high, too.

One thing I will miss about Boston is the fact that it’s not a hater town. Bostonians LOVE things. They love the Sox, they love the Celtics, they love being the cradle of freedom. Just like they deck themselves in bright green for the Celtics, proudly displaying their loyalty, on the 4th of July they come out in reds, whites, and blues. They wear sparkly Uncle Sam hats, wrap themselves in flags; they sit on American flag towels, eating American flag popsicles. They rise to the national anthem without fail, hands over hearts, voices ringing out. They know the words. And last night, every time the veterans were saluted or remembered, the audience took to its feet with smashing applause, whistles and cheers. At first, they reminded me so much of Texans, and I was strangely comforted. And then I realized, it’s not so much that they are like Texans — it’s that they are Americans.

They are a people who, at least on this holiday, refuse to forget the cost of things. Freedom is not free, one banner read. The veteran in front of me wept for part of the ceremony, and his young friend — perhaps his son — decked in some sort of Ed Hardy-ish shirt, came over and sat behind him, rubbing his shoulders.

These days, I know, it’s sometimes hard to be proud to be American. We are told, with sneers, that Americans think they are better at everything; our errors and flaws are flaunted worldwide; our government’s complicated and often murky motives heralded as our only cause. And yet… what better time to wave the flag? If not in pride, then as a banner, a call. Surely a dark hour is the basic requirement for a dream — and ours is a dream by people in their darkest hours.

It is the dream of younger sons trapped by a classist society, religious men and women persecuted for their beliefs, tradesman seeking ownership of their work, explorers hungry for the untouched, visionaries who see a better life. It is the dream of people who do not fear their past or current limitations, who do not give up when the system seems unbeatable — the dream of people poised for change, for progress, a people secure in the knowledge of who they are and what a government owes them. Unalienable rights. It is the dream of men and women unafraid of work, confident in the immeasurable value of this investment’s return. It is a dream that begets a doing spirit, a dream that scorns idle musing without corresponding action. It is a dream with intent — the intent to be realized.

And because it is this kind of dream, it stands out in the world: unjaded, fresh, defiant. Foolish to the outsiders; young and naive to the naysayers. They would like us to lower our heads, to be buried under our failures and errors. But the real naivety is theirs — the belief that, though we were to reach even the lowest point, we could forget this dream. We gather on july 4th year by year, not necessarily in honor of what we are doing or what we have done, but to celebrate what we are, to remember where we have come from, and to declare that we ourselves, like the generations before us, will actively shape this dream into a reality.


currently, i am in: cambridge, ma

free and independent states

Posted by —

0

i love america SO MUCH. i mean SO SO much. and, if you didn’t know, july 2 is actually the day that independence was voted on (not july 4). and in honor of that, NPR conducts a reading of the declaration of independence. it’s under 9 minutes long, well-read by a score of different hosts, and truly inspiring.

i’ll have more to say on patriotism and america and so on :) in the upcoming days, i’m sure. for now, just enjoy the link.

rational national considerationals

Posted by —

0

i was thinking last night how cool it must have been to have been alive in america in the 1700s. i’m always impressed with the immensity of what the founding fathers and early settlers did. they built a nation. i mean really built it. from the ground up – the laws, the creeds, the governing theories were all theirs. sure, it had basis on their roots, but they started with as blank a slate as any. a new world.

i was thinking how much cooler it would be to live in that time, to watch politics unfold then – and i had a rare moment of appreciation for congress today. especially as regarding the whole health care reform debacle. we’re a much more complicated nation now, with more politics than i think anyone is comfortable with – even those people who orchestrate and operate within the confines of the political arena. and yet, i suppose, they are doing the same thing as the early american leaders were: building a nation.

i think of patrick henry, and others, who refused to sign the constitution, who fought for 10 amendments to guarantee individuals their sacred personal liberties. i wonder if the leaders in the other states rolled their eyes, if the colonists complained about the grandstanding and scare tactics, political machinations – if most of the americans were impatient to move on already, and frustrated with henry and his compatriots. when henry and many other antifederalists did not attend the original signing of the document, i wonder if the federalists lambasted them for their partisanship. i wonder what the tobacco farmers and shipbuilders and other special interest groups thought of it all. and i wonder how many people thought the bill of rights itself was nothing more than a over-the-top gesture.

and yet… i also wonder how many federalists were relieved at henry’s adamant insistence for the bill of rights – how many wanted those 10 amendments but felt their hands were too tied to demand them…

anyway, just some thoughts to get the day going.

oh, canada…

Posted by —

0

anyone remember the 1992 robert redford film a river runs through it? it tells the story of the two maclean brothers and their adventures as they grow up. norman is the older, more serious maclean; and paul (played by brad pitt) is his wilder, charismatic brother. i don’t remember much about the film except the characters, and as i consider my feelings about canada, i’m reminded of the film.

i see canada and america as being basically cut from the same cloth, brothers, as it were: immigrant nations in the new world, full of frontiersmen and explorers. and yet — i always feel like canada is just so much more sensible and even-tempered than america is. i’m not entirely sure why i think that – they just seem more responsible, less ostentatious. and i feel like america is the hot-headed, unpredictable younger child, still stumbling around long after the older brother has learned to walk. and yet, though norman seems to have more sense, paul has more purpose. and more fire.

ok, maybe i’m a little biased… :)

slumburbia

Posted by —

0

It’s not our cities that are in big trouble: what will fill the empty homes and lots of suburban America?

Timothy Egan addresses this question in his latest nytimes.blog post, “slumburbia.” “Nobody is home in the cities of the future,” Egan writes. and then he notes, “Though sick, foreclosure alley is not terminal. This is not Detroit with sunshine. It will be reborn, remade, inhabited. The question is: as what?”

As what indeed. Egan rejects Christopher B. Leinberger’s thesis in “The Next Slum?” (Atlantic, March 2008) – that the areas with the most foreclosures would  be turned into slums, homes into tenements. Instead of embracing such a fate, Egan puts his trust in an esoteric guardian: “Through it all, the country churns and expands, unlike most other Western democracies. That great American natural resource — tomorrow — will have to save the suburban slums.”

Leinberger’s article is powerful stuff, though written several years ago, and Egan admits to its influence. Leinberger references such statistics as this: “In the first half of last year, residential burglaries rose by 35 percent and robberies by 58 percent in suburban Lee County, Florida, where one in four houses stands empty. Charlotte’s crime rates have stayed flat overall in recent years—but from 2003 to 2006, in the 10 suburbs of the city that have experienced the highest foreclosure rates, crime rose 33 percent.”

“For 60 years, Americans have pushed steadily into the suburbs, transforming the landscape and (until recently) leaving cities behind. But today the pendulum is swinging back toward urban living, and there are many reasons to believe this swing will continue. As it does, many low-density suburbs and McMansion subdivisions, including some that are lovely and affluent today, may become what inner cities became in the 1960s and ’70s—slums characterized by poverty, crime, and decay.”

Ultimately, Leinberger’s point isn’t just about the slums – it’s also about the trend towards urban living among middle class citizens. Salted with an impressive array of demographic statistics, he takes the reader on a trip across the decades, highlighting the living styles of Americans for the past century or so.

Of course, Leinberger was writing in March 2008, when the worst was just beginning, and we all saw the future as particularly bleak. Egan’s perspective, tempered by time and the recent upward trend, is understandably more hopeful. I wouldn’t go as far as to disagree with Leinberger — knowing the enemy helps you better combat him; but when it’s all said and done, I find myself more aligned with Egan.

american

Posted by —

2

i just saw a headline that said it’s unamerican to complain about taxes (i assume the article, which i didn’t even glance at, is about the tea-party craze)… yeah… um… isn’t that how america got started in the first place? technically, isn’t it  inherently american to complain about taxes?