I first visited these United States of America in the Fall of 2003.
I had quit smoking and joined a Usenet Support Group. One of the people I met there was a woman, and a Kossack as it happens, from Maryland. I was invited to visit and spend Thanksgiving with her and her partner. It was she who introduced me to this Blog, so yep, it's Kelly's fault!
The following is a brief moment from that visit, and a reflection on some of what has transpired since.
Oh yeah ... another person I met in that same place is the reason I live here now. She is my wife!
Given the theme of this Diary I was tempted to post it on RedState, or freerepublic, but as they come here ...
Eeny-meeny-miny-mo, to which Smithsonian shall I go?
I had one day in Washington DC. About twelve hours to walk the streets, in a non-prostitute kind of way. Just a tourist and like all the others I had my camera, a map, guide books and a few dollars to get me through the day.
I have to tell you that your National Mall is magnificent. From the Capitol steps to the White House I walked, without entering either. The Capitol was shut, no idea why, and I didn't fancy taking tea with the incumbent at the other end of the street.
My other observation is that there are way too many museums lining that wonderful boulevard, well too many to see in a day. Probably too many for a month, or a lifetime, so I decided to pick just one.
It was with great expectations, well you knew I was a Brit, that I climbed the steps and entered The National Museum of American Life. It was here I thought I might find at least hints of what it was to be American. I was not to be disappointed.
As I walked into a great hall, there to the left was George Washington, imperious and austere, but welcoming nonetheless. Right in front was a flag, hanging limply on the wall. It was a large flag. I knew by then that Americans are particularly proud of displaying their National Flag, but this was not flying over a car dealership. This was not a flag being despoiled by the tawdry ambition of commerce. This flag has a rather more poignant history, if a very recent one.
This Stars and Stripes was the same flag that was draped over the ugly gash in the Pentagon, caused by a hijacked aircraft being flown into the building on that day in September, 2001.
I am not even through the door and already the pathos of the place is seeking out my soul. The rest of this building had better top the introduction, or I would be feeling a bit let down. Again, I was not to be disappointed.
I spent hours wandering through everything from Julia Child's Kitchen, to a steam locomotive that reminded me of Casey Jones and his Cannonball Express. I saw the first car to cross America from East to West, a journey of six weeks in a vehicle that looked like it would struggle to cross our front yard. The other day I crossed the desert in New Mexico, from Oklahoma and back in about thirty hours including sleep. I had roads, they didn't and I think they were a good deal tougher than me.
A wonderful Native American exhibit felt oddly out of place. That's a strange thing to be saying and I do not know why I felt that way. It's almost like I thought that in a place filled with locomotives and things representative of a pioneering people, then maybe the Native American Exhibit should also have shown the genocide. I may have been harsh. It was my first visit here and I came with all the ignorance of the average tourist. Anyway, the rest of the place wasn't labeled "White American Life", so maybe it was the distinction that jarred.
I stood for a long time in front of the lunch counter from the Greensboro Woolworths. An insignificant artifact really but for the enormity of the Civil Rights Movement, spawned by four African American students who decided that they wanted lunch. The sheer courage of those young people is surely an inspiration to us all.
Then came the moment that I turned a corner, entered a dimly lit passageway and saw it .... The Star Spangled Banner.
There was no one else around. Just me, a glass wall, a softly playing commentary and the symbol of a nation spread out on the biggest table I have ever seen. It's a tatty piece of cloth, faded and torn with some pretty big bits missing. It is Waterloo, it is the Alamo and it is the Crown Jewels of my now adopted country.
Back then it was not my flag, indeed it represented the defeat of my country in battle. Yet I knew. I could feel the emotion with which it was being lovingly preserved, taste the blood that had been spilled that, by the dawn's early light, our Flag was still there.
I am not, was not American. Just a tourist, a rubber-necker yet I could know the power of that symbol, feel the spirit that built this country .... So with that in mind, I have a few questions:
This is a land populated by self-made people. You cut the lumber with handsaws, and built cities. They were tough times and folk relied on their neighbours. When did you forget that you need each other? When did it become fashionable to call those less fortunate, scroungers and deadbeats?
When did so many people in this country forget that they gave thanks to God for the fruit of the land, and allow the Church to become the masters?
Why have women, for so many generations respected by their menfolk, become the pawns in a disgusting spectacle played out in a vicious and discreditable Primary Season?
You built your Public Schools that the nation would benefit from an educated population, and drive the increasing prosperity. Why then are the schools rotting and the teachers so reviled?
Your Military is respected throughout the world, but why have they been on permanent active duty since World War Two? How many must they kill on behalf of a country that has never had it's own borders threatened?
Why does this United States allow people to get sick and die, when they could easily be cured, then blame them for not being able to afford care?
How can it be that generations of your fathers fought, and some died to bring decent wages and conditions, yet in 2012 people stand by and watch those gains rolled back, many blaming the very unions that fought for you?
I know this will be read mainly by people that I respect, and generally we agree on policy matters. My questions in your case, are rhetorical. To the others, the ones who prefer a flag with a snake on it, or with Stars and Bars (you lost, get over it); to you I simply have this to say ...
Go to the National Museum of American Life. Gaze on that Flag as I gazed upon it. Try to remember that you are one people, one Nation. You need each other and you need to re-learn how to treat each other. You need to remember that you are Americans, and that carries a responsibility that some of you are willfully shirking.
Gaze on that Flag, and weep ... I did!