…Drumroll, please!…
10. WalMart! McDonald’s! Starbucks!
…oh. Wait. I forgot we took over the planet with our supersized mindlessness. Moving on…
9. We might be technically owned (and maybe even operated) by China, but they ain’t got nothin’ on our Chinese food!
8. You can carry a gun, kill an intruder in your home and even end the life of a fetus using taxpayer’s money; but even if you purchase a bulletproof vest or a health insurance plan, the premiums and efficiency of either can’t protect you from the statistical likehood of your death occurring almost a decade before the majority of other “first world” countries.
7. The metric system. Huh?
6. Inner cities, rural counties, and especially these good ol’ suburbs. Nobody gets excluded from the excitement of the local shopping mall!
5. John Denver, the Rocky Mountains, bluegrass music, the Appalachian Mountains, Blue Oyster Cult and religious freedom. No sarcasm here, folks. This is the substance of all things good and worth our while.
4. Jesus. You know, despite the blinding darknesses of our increasingly shallow society, the light of God shines brightest in the most unexpected places. The local diner off route 66, the elementary schools, and even the scenic drives here all bear a certain presence of inexplicable grace and beauty.
3. The Fourth of July. Barbequed ribs, fried okra, explosive glory in prisms of neon, splashing across the horizon over rivers and skyscrapers with kids laughing and music playing. These things make me proud to be an American.
2. There is always somebody knocking on our door. Asking if we are afraid of going to hell, soliciting support for the local T-Ball Tournaments through candy bar gluttony, delivering our Amazon purchases and occasionally relieving us of our children for a few hours with outdoor play. But sometimes the doorbell rings because our neighbors cooked us some love and dropped by to share it. That’s as American as it gets.
1. Women vote, give birth, make a living, and occasionally even marry each other. Men allow this to happen. (As opposed to… You know, trying to stop us and discovering we somehow became smarter than they are somewhere along the way.) Although… I won’t say what I think of Sarah Palin holding the microphone in representation of We The People…
We work as though our life depends on it, because life in America sort of does depend on it. However…
I like #4. Especially the way you put it.
Thanks brotherman! Miss your face! I actually pulled up the WP reader this morning specifically looking to catch up on your blog posts, among a couple choice others. I had finally landed my rear end in a comfortable spot; the kids all dropped off where they go, the baby down for his nap, the house phone unplugged and I clicked on my reader.
My smart device died. All that horrific effort for nothing.
I suppose that for now, my mini-novella here must suffice to inform you that I often do, in fact, wonder what you have to say these days.
I would’ve saved my time and visited your blog instead, but this is LITERALLY the NINTH time in a row I have found a quiet moment in which I tried to visit your blog and immediately a catastrophe ensued.
Bless me in my comings and goings, won’t you? Maybe that will do the trick.
If I don’t know better, I’d swear there’s some insidious figure robed in stress that is pulling you away from these quiet moments. I pray peaceful blessings on you, gentle miss.
Ah. Insidious figure, robed in pride, comprised of pain, madly manifesting massive stress mania in my already hilariously chaotic world.
You wise and compassionate soul.
There is this, however: sometimes when it becomes too much, I step outside and begin preparing the earth beneath my gracious feet for planting all my hopeful seeds. And that, for now, is enough for me.
Your kindness… My, it reaches. Thanks.
On the count of 7, the whole idea of a metric system (units of 10s) came out of the Americas (The Incas in Peru), the French just rehashed it and expanded
This particular item of interest was facetious in nature.
The United States does not use the metric system. We use the absolutely ridiculous Imperial Conversion system. Because we like to complicate our existence to stand out from the crowd. Or something. Seriously, it is baffling.
Random trivia for the day: out of every country on this entire planet, there are only two other countries besides the US who do not use the metric system.
Lyberia and Burma.
Hence my sarcasm.
So did we, Once (the Imperial system of weights and measures), it was everywhere. In surveying we use to use measurements like Links, and Chains.
This was simply brilliant.
You knocked it right out of the park from #10 on!
High five! Ka-CHSHH!!
Thanks.
Your presence has been missed here!
I can’t comment of course, because I’m NOT American. But it made me smile, nonetheless
Good bluegrass and fried okra make up for a host of other national sins…
I don’t hang out here often enough…your blog is lovely.
Sweet sister, precious soul! My spirit feels so blessed by your gracious words. Thank you! I’ll have to let you know how this pecan our turns out… It sure smells incredible so far!!
For anyone reading this, check out Ms. Rodalena’s blog. Moving words and awesome recipes on occasion too!