Family and Country

I work and live in one of the most progressive, nay LIBERAL, places in the United States of America.  We welcome immigrants--hell, we're ALL immigrants!  The fact that my ancestors arrived in 1620 in Jamestown, Virginia, or 1634 in Massachusetts Bay, Massachusetts, or even 1750 at the port of Philadelphia in Pennsylvania doesn't matter a fuck's sake when compared to my neighbor, Tikako who emigrated from Japan in 1980 or Gordon and his wife who came from Guyana in 1992, or even the family from El Salvador four doors down who arrived in 2006.  I watched their son grow up and now he's in early 20's.  Every morning when I walk Romeo at 6:15 AM I pass him as he's walking up the hill to catch the bus to go to work.  Every since our first greeting now some 13 years ago, he has always addressed me as "sir". 

"Good morning, sir.  How are you today?"

"Well," I reply, "And yourself?"

"Good.  Everything's good.  You have a great day."

"You, too.  Take care of yourself." I usually add.  Something I add whenever speaking to young men of color these days.

So it was that on this week of Thanksgiving with all of its controversies and misappropriations that my week began with an event that illustrates something else about the place I live.  Something that some in this nation are intentionally being deceived into not believing by forces that seek to tear us apart as a nation--and, I will add, under the present administration have an agent of disinformation and division right at the very top.

One of our first grades (we have seven!) has been pen pals to a group of Navy personnel deployed in Afghanistan.  The impetus is that the father of one of the boys is a radiologist at the hospital located at Bagram-BAF there.  Last Friday, they received a package full of letter of response and something else.  Something quite special.  An American flag that had flown over that hospital in Afghanistan. It cam with a certificate of authenticity (but since the package was from Afghanistan, there wasn't any doubt in the minds of the six year-olds!)

On Monday, we held a little ceremony, complete with a presentation by one of our administrators and then the little boy and his brother in third grade raised the flag to fly over our school for the day.  To the delight of everyone, the entire celebration was live streamed to the men and women at the hospital in Bagram, Afghanistan.  At the end the students, along with a couple of other classes who came out to witness the event, recited the Pledge of Allegiance.  The soldiers and officers on the other side of the planet joined in.  It was a very special event, a act of support and patriotism.  The heart of why America is Great, has always been great in spite of our flaws, and will remain great in spite of those who think otherwise.