God Bless America, Land That I Love!

 

So yesterday was Independence Day, 2023. What did you do to celebrate?

 I am visiting my son and daughter-in-law for the last couple of weeks in New York. So, first I watched my grandchildren ride their bicycles. Watched Joey Chestnut eat 62 hot dogs (BLEH). Then, I bought them Mr Softee root beer floats. It was on to watching the Mets game on SNY (They won).  Had a barbecue with chicken, steak, burgers and yes, the All-American meal, hot dogs.

Then as night approached, we went down to the beach to watch fireworks. It was actually spectacular watching the colors in the sky with no obstructions or intrusions. With people I did not know.

 And this is what this commentary is all about. Celebrating America’s 247^th year of Independence and freedom, with people of all races, colors and creeds without checking to see if they were like me. Because, no matter whether they are white, black, Hispanic or Asian, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish or Muslim, we were all Americans celebrating as Americans the glory of being American.

 That was the purpose 247 years ago: Not to be English living in North America. No, it was to be free of the British yoke around the necks of free men and women. Yes, we took a long time ourselves to realize what it means to be American. Heck, we even have a Civil War in our past which ultimately helped us realize this. And we still needed another one hundred or so years to make certain all of us benefited from the corrections made to the sins of our past.

 As I watched the starbursts and listened to noise created by the fireworks, I thought about what it was like to be an American in 1776. The living conditions were not nearly as luxurious as anything we have now. Soldiers were forced to wear clothes tattered by the weather for weeks on end. They fought with their valor and gumption, sometimes without ammunition. Or without eating for days on end. But they had faith they were fighting for a greater cause than themselves.

 And when it was over, their sacrifices were made all the more blessed because they had faith in their cause, which was righteous, and their faith in God, which was just.

 So that is how I spent Independence Day, cherishing the life I was blest to live in a country, with all of its problems, as a free man without the government telling me what I MUST do. Instead, if I choose not to follow what the government says is what is required of me, I remember that the government works for me and not that I do what the government says.

 In my view, the most important words of the Declaration of Independence are: But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government.

 And for this, I thank God I was born in this Country, with all of its sins and its problems, because I am free to say what I want without punishment or persecution.

God Bless America, Land That I Love! Happy Birthday Americans!