A few weeks ago I was standing in a car wash waiting while they changed my oil and washed my 1998 Ford Limone, just browsing the hundreds of air fresheners that were inundating my senses. I happened upon an interesting tid-bit that I found rather amusing at the time. I noticed that there was a section of the airfreshener rack filled with freshy-hangy things shaped and colored like the flags of about ten different nations; Puerto Rico, Jamaica, Israel just to name a few that I specifically recall. I did not see a single American flag. Nor an empty space where it could have been. At the time I thought absoulutely nothing of it. Just passed if of as a quirk of mine that I should even notice something so insignificant to begin with.
As the days past I totally forgot about this little musing of mine, until I was driving to work in the gaping ass hole of New Jersey that its residents call Linden (it really is a gross city). I noticed en route to my palace of indentured servitude that there were flags flying on alot of the residences in the area, but none were American.
I know what you're thinking. What the hell is this guy talking about? Who cares?
Well you're right. Who cares?
That's the point.
I consider myself extremely well versed in all things American History. It's sort of a pet topic of mine in my reading, and in discussion. Several of the books pertaining mainly to the birth and growth of what we now know as the United States of America were written entirely from primary sources, and more to the point, many of them read like a journal. These books of which I speak, like 1776 by David McCoulough for example, emphasize the excitement and pride that was taken in this governmental experiment.
Over time, as a child does with a new toy, we as an entity have gradually began to lose our fervor for our American nation.
The Civil War can be called the ealiest example of that loss, although that is debatable.
Civil Rights is next, hand in hand with everyone's favorite policing action: the Vietnam War.
The government's handling of those two situations was sub-par at best. Enter disillusionment.
And then there was Nixon. In just a few short years he managed to nearly eradicate the reverence his office was held in. Enter contempt.
uh oh.
Somewhere in our 233 years of sovereignty we have lost our sense of National Pride, and I think I see a pattern.
It has come to a point now after so many lies, letdowns, and lame excuses that our people have lost their faith in their government. Which is ok! It happens to every nation! What scares me however is the notion that we have lost our faith in our nation. As a people as diverse as we are we need a common bond. Until this century the "Kulture Amerikana," as it were, was that bond. It has come to a point in this country where and Italian flag is just as common, if not more so, than the stars and bars.
But hey, at least I can get a Congolese air freshener.
