I Am An American

I went to an island far away. A place where the trees are gardens suspended in the air. The waves gently polish the sand.

Trucks and motorcycles veer around each other, horns blaring. People have darker faces, brighter smiles. They don't speak my language.

 

We showed a Voice of the Martyrs cartoon. Adults and children stared at the screen, riveted.

 

The girls play clapping games. The boys climb trees.

 

I came back to a country glutted with entertainment and materialism.

 

We claim causes that don't matter. Defend the people who are doing just fine.

 

We're the priest and the Levite and we look the other way, while the people living far away suffer and die.

 

We play with our ipods and we refuse to consider the people who don't get to eat today.

We kill babies and put a transgender man on a pedestal for no other reason. 

 

I don't love this about America.

 

But I do love America.

 

Every day, people tell me that I shouldn't love my country. In person, on the internet, on TV. They tell me that we are the problem, the busybody sticking her nose where it doesn't belong. They tell me that we only cause harm in the world.

 

That we should hang our heads and reluctantly mumble that yeah, we're Americans.

It seems like many younger people really think they're clever for believing that America is the bad guy of the world. 

 

Politicians have lied, they've made mistakes. They've gotten involved for all the wrong reasons. I know this.

 

But I look back at my country's past and I see, behind all of the greedy, selfish, and deceitful men, a powerful army of the strong and honorable and selfless.  Leaders who got involved because they actually cared about the oppressed. Soldiers who left their families to fight for people they'd never even met. People who spoke up for the things they believed at the cost of their jobs and reputations. Architects and artists and writers and musicians who built up our culture, piece by piece, and bolstered it and strengthened it, so that we could enjoy their labor without a second thought.

 

Imagine giving your entire life to a light bulb, a book, a building, an album. 

Americans sacrificed for Americans so that we could come together and be one. E pluribus unum. So many backgrounds, religions, ethnicities, opinions, but we share so much too. We make each other better. 

 

How can you be ashamed of the land where you were born, where you were blessed with all of this, the blood and the sweat and the tears of millions? Where you hold education and culture and health and opportunity in your hands for so long that you barely even realize you're doing it anymore?

 

I visited an island rich in color.

 

But my country is rich as well.

 

And I've seen so much of it.

 

I've looked at the lights of a city when they seemed as countless as the stars in the sky. And every single light was put in place by a person. Every window of every building was carefully constructed. I've been in art museums and looked at paintings, and every painting was a tiny piece of a person's life that I got to view without effort or cost. I've passed fields where farmers toiled so that I could buy corn on the cob wrapped up in plastic at Walmart. I've seen stores and bought products that were the life work of entrepreneurs. I've pulled books off a shelf of the library and read them. And every page of every book  was typed up, words carefully selected and edited and edited again.

 

I've looked at waterfalls crashing down so that I could feel their power throughout my body. I've stood at the edge of the vast expanse that is the Grand Canyon and I've driven on a bridge over a wrinkled-up shining river. I've walked on paths where wildflowers bloom and I've stared out the windows of a Greyhound bus in a desert that I thought would never end.

 

I've sat in a classroom where I spent years of my life learning, learning, learning. Listening and filling in blanks and working calculus problems. I played games on computers and I wrote poems. I practiced piano. I had time to do these things, because I didn't have to support my family when I was eight years old.

 

And I can say the things that I think on this blog, and I get to vote and go to church and use the Internet. And other people burn the flag of my country and they lobby for the things that they want and they tell lies and they slander policemen. We do these things because we are free. We are free.

 

I hold this richness in my hands, and now I can give it away. One day I will read stories to Haitian children, because I sat in a clean, safe American classroom and I learned how to read. I will teach them to count money because my mom had time and she drilled me with addition and subtraction facts. I will teach them about the world because I've had time and money to travel and I've read books. I will give to people less fortunate than me and I'll accept them as they are and love them because I live in a country where these things have always been valued.

 

America is my past, and it is giving me my future.

 

I don't know what my life would be like if America did not exist. It would certainly be less wonderful in many ways.

When you love your family, you don't make sure nobody thinks that you're saying you had a special family better than other families. You talk about the positive things, the things you are thankful for.

I am proud to be an American. I am thankful for America. For its history, its beauty. For the opportunities it has given me.

I disagree that it is the bad guy of the world. I believe that it is still a great country and a kind one. And I disagree that we should focus on recent negative changes rather than on the blessings we've enjoyed as Americans. Of course, we desire and work for continued freedom. But you and I... we have nothing to complain about. We have no reason to be ashamed of our country. It is amazing.