Nostr Web Client

I’m not often proud of myself or self satisfied in anyway, but one thing I am proud of is my fundamental American-ness.

When people are like you’re an arrogant American I’m like “yes. Yes I am.”

It actually makes me happy when they say that lol

I am American to my core. I was raised on American principles by my father and grandfather who were both good Americans themselves.

I’m not confused about what America is. I’m not confused about what an American is or what it means to be one.

I have no real desire to learn much about my Irish or German roots.

I have no desire to travel outside of America. I mean I have and I will if necessary but like why? You know?

I love America. I’m a part of America. I want the best for America. I believe America is worth fighting for.

My daughter asked me what it means to be an American and I told her it means you can do whatever the fuck you feel like as long as you’re not harming another person.

That’s America.

Freedom. Something no one can ever take away from you. No matter what some dweeb in Washington tells you.

America is unruly. It’s restless. It’s chaotic. It’s beautiful. Like shockingly breathtakingly beautiful.

Reverence for personal liberty. Suspicion of the government. Fear of regulation. Fear of other people’s good intentions. Comfort with disorder over control. America motherfucker.

Loud brash chaotic hypocritical argumentative unruly contradictory half finished…

I’m proud to be an American.

DagzTagz 5d ago

Same.

I don’t love statism,

but I do love America.

I also love Chicago.

I love my family.

I love my neighbors.

I love my neighborhoods.

I love Chopin, the tiny Polish theatre in Wicker Park where I tried my first Pączki and watched a full length film with UChicago students in their native language.

I love the tiny Christian college where I meditated with Tibetan monks.

I love Ruth Page, the ballet school I went to on Dearborn where I got yelled at in Russian and French by my dance teachers who were often immigrants from the Soviet era.

I love Red Bud in Michigan where me and a bunch of my trashy moto friends gather for 4th of July every year to watch dirtcycles race.

I love Badlandz where sometimes we fuck each other with paintball guns while we ride ATVs, SxS, and pitbikes.

I love the inner city poetry slams where the BIPOC community puts out some of the soulful art I’ve ever encountered.

I love Notre Dame, the Catholic college where we light candles in Mary’s Grotto before we watch the best football.

I love the New Mexican rez where you certainly are reminded that magic, without a doubt, is real.

To be American is to be deeply rooted in a paradoxically collective and ruggedly individualistic culture that outwardly looks vastly different but inwardly means to be wholly aligned with a fundamental value system that says- we love freedom, we love liberty, we love prosperity, and we protect this space that we have carved out as ours despite what we look, speak, or pray like while we welcome, with warmth, others who share in those values.

That is humanity at its best.

nostr:nevent1qqsps6r9kuzzwjkhtrs8tg8kdx2vaxef4ppq0mqsj2exj9mft0zwyxgpp4mhxue69uhkummn9ekx7mqkpwu3t

Reply to this note

Please Login to reply.

Discussion

HODL 4d ago

Chicago is the best American city in my opinion