America RIP

I wrote this a year ago prior to the 4th of July...

America RIP Born July 4^th 1776- died sometime in the last few years

America passed away quietly this year while most people were at home going on with their everyday lives not even taking note of the passing of this amazing giant. This was not a sudden illness or accident that brought about her untimely death, but she had been sick for many years and had suffered from a multitude of ailments that chipped away at her heart and soul.  It’s strange how some do not now even recognize or mark her passing as they go on with life thinking that coming to the point of her passing would never be possible because she had withstood so much and for so long.

  

With the coming of her birthday on July 4^th, some will still celebrate her birth with pomp and circumstance while those who have watched and taken note of her passing will solemnly commemorate a second memorial day this year.  Many songs and anthems have been written about her during her long and storied life.  Some of those will still be appropriate as a remembrance of the life she gave and the opportunities she provided for so many.

We will remember what she stood for and the principles that she espoused- those things that brought her and her people to amazing heights where just about anything was possible.  She was not perfect, but she was good.  When she viewed the dark side that was a mar on her birth, she and her close friends stared down that evil and paid a tremendous price to rid her of the cancer that surely would have taken her life much sooner.  She accomplished more, than any like her had previously done, in her lifetime bringing liberty, prosperity and protection to untold numbers of people.

We will remember liberty that she held so dear- the liberty to think, speak, and worship as we choose.  With that liberty, having the freedom to enjoy the fruits of our own labors; to engage in commerce, or not; and if we choose not to labor, well she let us live with the consequences of our own decisions. She didn’t hold our hand to protect us from dumb decisions (the protection she provided was from our enemies, not from ourselves), but she gave us the freedom to spend our labors for whatever we desired- for good or bad; for success or failure. 

Along the way some thought it unfair to have such freedom which included the freedom to fail! Such a freedom means that some people would inevitably fail, so while so many people still reveled in freedom those who were afraid of such freedom started planting the poisons that would eventually take her life.  Of some it is said “she lived great and she died great,” but sadly for her it can be said that she was born and lived great; she came in with the roar of a lion, but to our dismay the poison pills she took over such a long time transformed her until, at her last breath, she was a hollow shell of the greatness she once embodied.

I will shed tears on her birthday this year, but not those tears of the heart swollen with thankfulness and gratitude for the many opportunities and blessings that she passed on to all for so long, but tears of true sorrow and sadness for the passing of one of whom there was none other like her and will not likely be another.  Can she be brought back from the dead, resurrected to her former glory- I don’t know- maybe, but God bless America!  I am glad that I had the opportunity to know her well and I will remember and tell her story to all that care to listen.