I am a patriot; that means I participate.

why I choose to love this country and its flag, in spite of contradictions.

Happy Independence Day to all Americans!

I am a patriot. For me, that means that I love America, the USA, in all its tawdry, contradictory splendor.

Physically, and most of all, I love this country’s contours and rivers and mountains and deserts; I love its vastness and its extremes. I love its oceans and waterfalls, palm trees and beaches, snow-covered crags, and shimmering slot canyons.

I’ve loved these places enough to visit them. 

Have you?

I love the USA’s cities and its small towns; I love its hamlets best of all. 

I love that America is a place where you can invent, and reinvent yourself. Dozens of times if you want to… No one will stop you; nothing will but your own fear.

I’ve done it several times.

Have you?

 I love (and hate) that as a nation, we stagger along in the world,  the most generous in charity and giving, yet the most destructive in creating the wealth for that giving. I love (and hate) our starry eyes and naivete and unbridled opportunity, even when its cost can be greed and oppression.

The USA is still a place where, if you were willing to pay the price of hard work and hustle, nothing is off-limits. I also love that when you inevitably hit barriers of color, class, gender, and inequality, you can get up and leave and do something else, or throw yourself into the fray to fight for change.

I’ve done both.

Have you?

The United States is not, inherently, a comfortable place in which to be a citizen. No one will take care of you, or guarantee your survival. It can seem like no one cares, but really, they do. They are just too busy trying to figure out survival themselves.

Lip service will be given to your “rights,” but few will protect those rights without the means to pay for that protection.

We are founded on rebellion, and we remain as a people contentious, divided, passionate, aggressive, generous, idealistic, ready to grab up weapons at the least provocation, creative, pleasure-loving, hard-working, and hopeful in the most endearing way.

I am a patriot. That means I question my government and participate in it, even when I don’t feel represented, respected, or protected. If I don’t participate, I’ve already lost my voice in it—and so I persist.

I love my flag and feel the weight of all who’ve died to protect its meaning. That means I don’t let people I disagree with steal its symbolism from me. 

From sea to shining sea.

I proudly plant my red-white-and-blue in my front yard on Independence Day, even while cringing a bit because of all its contradictions, and worrying that I’ll be taken as one of those who’ve appropriated our flag for an agenda I don’t share.

I love the USA with open, peace-loving eyes, on the days when my values are celebrated and upheld, and on the days when they are not.

But for the person who wants freedom, in all its overrated, ridiculous, glorious risk, there is nowhere like the USA. America is a place where we get to be contradictory; we get to express ourselves in gatherings, in writing, in media, in our dress, in whatever way we want to.

Or we can turn off the screens and go for a hike in an urban jungle or a forest, and savor our freedom to do so, alone.

If this has stirred you even a little, hit the ❤️ and pass it on. I welcome your comments, too.