An Annual Celebration of Courage

The Fourth of July is a celebration of boldness. From one year to the next, I forget that it’s more than a day that the mail doesn’t come, more than a day of vacation. (Though I’m self-employed, I generally loaf on the same days the rest of my world does.)

But yesterday both Prairie Home Companion and the celebration on the Mall in D.C. stirred once again my pride in the best of the U.S., and that includes having shaken loose to become an independent nation. It took some serious and costly shaking to make that happen. Some of my scrappy old relatives were in on it—all but one on the side of Independence (and that one Royalist had to have had a bold streak as well).

This legacy isn’t all good; one of the same relatives led a company of soldiers that destroyed several Native American villages.

I’ll probably never pick up a musket myself—or a handgun. I’m lucky never to have been faced with the decision. A big piece of that “luck” is that others have insured my independence. My responsibility is merely to have the courage to fully—and wisely—use it. Once again, the fireworks and the music remind me.

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