When we moved here from Arizona, we brought along the box of books that the used book store wouldn’t give us credit for. We toted along the tuperware that had lost its lids like errant socks in the dryer. For that matter, the errant socks also made the move with us. But the flag pole that I had dutifully mounted on the front porch of our log house in the pines… I left it. For one thing, I didn’t feel like asking our movers to unload our ladder so that I could loosen the pole and bring it down. And to be honest, the weather had worn it into ratty disrepair. Mostly though, I left it because a flag pole is meant to fly The Flag, and I had taken down our American Flag the day that Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq.
I didn’t think much about it until late in the election cycle. Then one evening I mentioned to my wife that if Barack became president, I might just fly the flag again.
Yesterday, I wandered the aisles of Home Depot until I found myself back in the back corner, just down from the bird feeders and behind last year’s inventory of garden supplies. Go to any Home Depot in the country and in the same place you’ll find the same thing: a small display of flags and poles looking somewhat disheveled.
I stood there for a while, thinking about Barack Obama. I believe in the man. I think he is wise and patient and presidential. I campaigned for him, and I support him more now than I did then. When he speaks, I feel things that I haven’t felt in years, and I often find tears where tears should be. He gives me hope.
Still, I left Home Depot without a new flag pole. Having given it more thought, I realized that I could not fly The Flag for just one man. It should be flown for the whole country, and I still don’t have enough faith in us. After all, this is the country where we package our flags in neat cellophane then let them gather dust in the back corners of our hardware stores.
President Obama challenged us in his inaugural address today. He spoke of the difficulties that surround us, and he said in simple terms that the only thing that can turn America around is the American People. I wonder if we can. I wonder if we are willing enough, wise enough and passionate enough to turn the tide of history.
I lay out the same challenge for our people as the President. America, can you dig deep enough in your hearts to do that which is good and honest and true? Can you pull together as a people, as The People, as that energetic mass that powers the shining light on the hill? Can you open your arms to the world and show them strength and kindness? Can you teach your children that passing a school test every year does not prepare them to pass the test of life?
America, can I fly The Flag again?
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6 comments:
Let me preface my comment with a few words about myself. I have just last year become a US citizen. And I have kept my German citizenship as well. So my perspective about this may be different from that of most Americans.
The country I grew up in is very leery of flying the flag. You do that too much and people will think of you as nationalistic, maybe even suspect to be even more to the right than that. It's a country where a democraticly elected leader had done away with civil rights and liberties. He drove the country into a disastrous war and into self destruction. And he and his followers loved flying the flag.
Do I compare the departing president with that regime? Or the quarter of the population that STILL approved of Doubja with the German Nazis? ABSOLUTELY NOT.
I am explaining why where I come from very few people fly the flag. And why I fly neither a German nor an American flag in front of my house.
My point? I'd love to feel like flying a flag in front of my house. I'd love to tell my children how proud I am to be an American and how proud they should be, too.
And yesterday for the first time since moving here I thought that day might come. And that made me very happy.
Hi! :)
(Omegamom made me do it. :D)
I think you are right that. America has some growing up to do, some ammends to make, and to realize that *we* make this country. Not a man in office, not a war with another country - we, The People, make America who she is. It is time we begin realizing that...soon!
I am not - and have never been known to be - a flag waver. But your post gave me pause for consideration. Perhaps we should make a waiver for the flag. We are so bouyed up by Barack and we want the country to succeed. But how do we start? What can I do as an individual? Can I start by waving the flag, thereby making it the statement of Hope?
I hadn't thought about raising the flag, but I did wear red, white and blue on January 20th. And I let people know that it was my nod towards participating as an American.
The energy from these tiny symbolic gestures could have far-reaching, positive returns. At least, that's my Hope.
I have a suggestion, based on your post above this one about the flag and Home Depot...
.... if it had been me, I would have found the store manager. I would have asked him or her to please move the box of flags to the front of the store.
I would then go home and write a letter to the President of Home Depot requesting that the flag box always be in the front of their stores.
Flying the flag has nothing to do with being on the right or on the left... it's a statement that you believe in our Constitution... no matter who you vote for.
That's my 2 cents.
Hmmm...this really makes me think. Not knee-jerk react, but think. At first, I agreed with you about not flying the flag, in part because there are some who fly it to be "Patriotic" in caps, and to follow the regime (whichever that happens to be), and not flying it seems a protest to that attitude.
But perhaps one could look at it as flying the flag as a sign of respect for and agreement with all of those things that it SHOULD stand for - the rule of law, respect, a fabulous and flexible document that's kept us going despite subversion, dissent and idiocy for over 200 years...I'm not articulating this well, but maybe it's about what the flag means to you, not what you want others to think about it.
Follow up: I was in Home Depot yesterday...guess what was right up front by the registers? Yup, a box of American flags.
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