On Patriotism...

For better or for worse, I feel inextricably and deeply defined by my own Americanism. Raised on hot dogs, macaroni and cheese and apple pie and nurtured on fireworks and baseball, I am rooted to this country, and especially the West, in a way that is difficult to articulate." In his novel "The Emigrants," W.G. Sebald describes a man in this way: "... a German to the marrow, profoundly attached to his native land in the foothills of the Alps" and I have carried that with me ever since. I knew then that regardless of my love for travel, my desire to see every inch of this world and my strong affinity to Canada, my American-ness is in the marrow. And this has led me to a continue a long inward discussion what it means to be a "good" American, both what it means today and what it meant then. 

In all that time, I have become certain of one thing: that to be a good American means asking questions. It involves a healthy amount of insolence, skepticism and rebelliousness of spirit. I like to think that that is what America was borne of... great minds who decided to seek that most elusive and precious right of independence in "times that try men's souls." I think a "good" American is always pushing, resisting, questioning while still maintaining the idealism and hope that has sustained this nation in times of difficulty and prosperity. Both hope and dissent are vital to the health and strength of our nation. Edward R. Murrow once said: "We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. When the loyal opposition dies, I think the soul of America dies with it." 

It is easy in a world that is increasingly difficult to polarize, and even reconcile, to try to overly simplify, ally entirely with one camp or another and accuse liberally of lack of patriotism. But blind acceptance and obedience is another sort of treason. Ignorance will never foster progress, nor will it inspire passion. Ultimately, we must all strive to become the third sort of  patriot in William Sloane Coffin's three types of patriots...

"There are three kinds of patriots, two bad, one good. The bad ones are the uncritical lovers and the loveless critics. Good patriots carry on a lover's quarrel with their country, a reflection of God's lover's quarrel with all the world."

With that said, I have a confession. It very well may be that today, this very day, I found myself actually crying upon the realization that Ernie Pyle died at age 45 in the Pacific. It could also have been the culmination of emotion from a film on the Second World War complete with images and excellent writing that did me in. There was something so overwhelmingly moving about the realization that just as Ernie Pyle loved and lived for the everyday, American GI, he died beside them. So, the real point of this is to say, hats off to Ernie Pyle. The musings on patriotism will be taken up again some other day, replaced by a little, childish, impulsive ode to a great man, writer and American patriot. 

"You feel small in the presence of dead men, ashamed at being alive, and you don't ask silly questions." -Ernie Pyle, "The Death of Captain Waskow" January 10, 1944