When I was a child, one of the things I was taught in elementary school was the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America. Throughout my life, I have learned, sometimes through the most painful of lessons, what those words mean. It's not just what they mean to me; it's what they really mean.
As we grow, and mature, we do so in different ways. We grow physically, spiritually, financially, emotionally...many different ways. We grow culturally, socially, nationally, and internationally, too. No matter where we go, there are many things we carry with us. Together, they create within each of us our "totality", or our personhood if you will.
If you look at how it is that our "personhood" is developed individually, you might find it in-credible that we could ever possibly find allegiance to anyone else, much less allegiance to a group, or a national identity.
In this particular election cycle, the process by which the United States of America establishes, or renews it's national personhood, I have learned things, many things. Some of the things I have learned, or am learning, are completely foreign to me. That is very discomforting in a very personal way. Some things, I am learning all over again, for the first time.
Follow me just below the squiggledoodlethingey fold, and I'll try to explain what I mean.
"I pledge allegiance, to the flag
of the United States of America;
and to the Republic for which it stands,
one nation, indivisible.
With Liberty, and Justice.
For all."
I can honestly report to you that I have never said those words without putting my hand over my heart. I have never, ever said them without meaning them with all my being. For as long as I shall live, so shall it always be. That's just me.
When I sing my nation's National Anthem, I remember the words. They are, for me, a love song. I feel them--all of them, including the fourth verse"
"Oh! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war's desolation!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto: "In God is our trust."
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!"
"The Star Spangled Banner"
Francis Scott Key-1814
I have always understood this as a nation's song; a song that her people sang together. We do it in crowds, at baseball games, and sometimes in Churches. There is not a hockey, basketball, or even football game which does not offer (sometimes even) stirring renditions of this love song of a people to her nation.
But this is also a love song of a nation to her people! As it is true of our National Anthem, so is it true for the Pledge of Allegiance. A pledge is an oath, a vow. It is a covenant between two different parties. A nation's anthem is a declaration. But it is not merely a declaration of a people, but also a declaration to a people.
As I age, I come to learn more and more of those things which I thought I understood. Learning is sometimes difficult, and even painful. That is because sometimes, we learn things which we thought we understood, but clearly do not. Sometimes, we learn things which confirm and verify that what we thought to be, is. Learning can often (some would say entirely too often, in fact) be painful.
As we come to learn, or understand things in a new, never before encountered reality, everything we thought we knew comes under suspicion. Doubt is created within our own minds. Because we are the sum total of our own personhood, these moments can effectively re-define us, personally. That is why many people, faced with the opportunity, responsibility, or even the obligation to learn--simply do not.
The process can be very painful, indeed. Our definition of self can be assaulted. Our values can be shaken to our very core. Our beliefs can be immutably uprooted, as well. Learning can take its toll on a person. Many people, given the moment, pass on the opportunity.
Many, however, do not. I am one of those people. It has, for the greatest measure, served me very well. There have been times, however, when it has caused me great pain, for all those reasons I have listed above. Yet, I have never (to my knowledge) knowingly shirked the task. I am a teacher; therefore I am a student. I have always desired to be a very good teacher; therefore I have always worked to be the very best possible student I can be. It is still true today. I hope it will always be so.
While I can understand those who step aside when given the opportunity of learning, I am not one of them. While I can empathize with their choice, I do not condone it. How could a teacher do such a thing?
There are those who seek, find and take the easy way out. Given their preferred, or at least understood personhood, they would rather have someone else understand and know the realities of life and struggle with them a la tilting of it, the windmill. They prefer not to know. They just wish to be told what they should know, or what they (or someone else) determines they need to know. No, I am not one of those persons.
In this election cycle, I am learning things of my nation, and her people that I have never known before. I believe there is a really simple reason for this.
My nation, and her people, have never been as we are today.
Regardless of your personal political beliefs, or the values you hold, or your personhood, you are a part of "We, the people of the United States of America". So, incidentally, is everyone you know: those you oppose by whatever definition you would choose, and those you have never met who are citizens of this nation.
President Abraham Lincoln once wrote that sometimes we must do things "In order to form a more perfect Union...". He was, regardless of your affinity for him, a man who knew the pain of learning. I am not Lincoln, not by any means. But, I do feel as if I can at least find affinity with some of the painful learning he had to endure. We remember him as a beloved (or despised, by many) 16th President of The United States of America. He was also the ruling President of a divided nation.
One of the things I am learning is of the realities a citizen must encounter, and learn when the nation they love so very much is divided. As a citizen, I will never be President, or anything akin to it. But, you see, I don't have to be. That's not the role assigned to me on this journey. I'm just a man, a simple, insignificant man. I have no desire for national office, or leadership of any kind whatsoever. I do have a role, however, to play in the future history of our nation. So do you, no matter how you define your personhood.
I am an American citizen.
Not only does the Star Spangled Banner sing to me, it belongs to me. Not only do I Pledge allegiance, but the flag pledges her allegiance to me. I must be quite honest with you. The nation referred to in these "founding documents" is really, really hard to see today. I cannot imagine someone in my country not knowing the America I love, yet I must honestly admit there is more than one generation who has never seen the America I love.
In that, in my personhood, I have learned enough of my nature to know that I am a Progressive Democrat, I am also nationally identified by that affiliation, and identified as such by many who have never met me, do not know me, and will never touch me. I do not permit that in my own life.
I've had the opportunity to have to give much of my personal, medical and financial freedom to another human being. Twice. (This is not counting my years in the Military.)
When I received a terminal diagnosis in 2006, I was required to assign those responsibilities, legally, to someone else. I did. They served me honorably. When I moved to my present home, I had to do it again. Not only once, but twice in my life I have had to find the one person in whom I could place my trust, with the full and certain knowledge that, should I be incapacitated, that one person would carry out not their desires and intentions, but mine exclusively. I know that in both instances, I made the correct choice.
While, even in that instance, I had to learn something all over again for the first time, I learned some things about my personhood. I acknowledge those parts of myself that could somehow be associated with "patriotism", and I am not ashamed of them. One of the traits of a true, deep patriot is knowing when your nation, your country is correct. But, if you truly desire to be a true, deep patriot, you must also learn when your country is wrong; incorrect. It is through the learning, and the knowing that wisdom comes.
There are some things deeply wrong in my country today. It does not take superior intelligence to realize that what I have always believed my country to stand for is, in many ways, not the way my country is standing today.
That doesn't require me to be a patriot. It requires me to be a citizen. With the recognition that some things are very deeply wrong in my country today, I then have a responsibility, a duty; an obligation to do my part to help make them right again.
I have no pre-determined right to expect success, or that those few, small things I can do will even bring my country anywhere near back to where she used to be. But that does not lessen my obligation to her. As I sing to her, so does she sing to me. As I pledge my allegiance to her, so does the United States of America continue to pledge her democracy, her freedom to me.
There are those in this land who would break her, who would re-define her in ways that she has never before been defined. The division among the people of my nation reminds me of the division felt by a future American President in 1858. Truly. I do not believe this to be right, or correct, or true. Yet, it is so very obvious as to be stunningly clear to me.
One of the most precious components of my particular personhood is the privilege I hold to be a citizen of the United States of America. In fact, my citizenship of this nation stands second only to my Christian faith in it's central character of my personhood.
My faith is defined by one, while my patriotism is defined by the second. I refuse to accept the notion that I am alone, or even in the minority in this truth. Nor do I accept the notion that only one political party can bring America, and the democracy she has been perfecting for more than 237 years, back to their former and rightful place.
If this is to be, it is going to take every single one of us, citizens all to do so. This election cycle has taught me things I thought I knew, and things I never knew. It has also convinced me that many of those things which I thought I know I actually DO know.
I want my nation back, and I will do that little bit I can do to achieve that end. My citizenship requires it of me. My patriotism inspires me to do what I can, even if it is no more than writing words.
There is so very much I wish I could do that I cannot do. No matter what I wish, there is much I cannot do. But, fortunately for me, there is something I can do. I can write what I know to be the truth, with an eye towards a happier and, perhaps even an again-unified and united land, not necessarily a land who demands to be correct. A better, or even more perfect union.
My opportunity to do that is imbued inside me through my citizenship. My obligation to do that is encamped within my true, deep patriotism. I have no particular heartfelt desire to be correct. My heartfelt desire is to be an honorable American citizen, who can look out over the national landscape, recognizing what it is that I see.
I do NOT believe that I am alone, nor even in the minority with this belief. It is my conviction that I am right about this, which requires me to ask every reader of these words to consider just where it is that you stand.
Is your citizenship more important than your party? Is knowing the truth more important to you than being told what the truth is? Are you willing to learn the hard and difficult lessons required to bring America home again, to restore, preserve, protect and defend Democracy?
I know many will hear, yet refuse this call. Some will laughingly refer to my words as so much emotional, patriotic drivel. I would ask those people to help me understand when such thoughts became irrelevant in America? Who, as citizen, would discount my words as being just so much emotional mush. Emotional? Of course. Mush, irrelevant, insignificant, unwanted, unnecessary? No.
I am an American Citizen. I am a writer.
It's really strange, but I can tell you that, in this election cycle, I have learned to understand these terms in an entirely new way, with a new perspective. In an entirely unknown, never before experienced light, I have learned these things anew.
I hope that you, from reading my words, my learn them too, even if it means learning them all over again, for the first time.
So help me God.