Because I'm Proud to be an American

When I look at our children, our daughters, our teens, I finally see who they'll be as young adults. Really see them. Never in a million years could my wife Amy and I imagined who they'd become. We do the best job we can of parenting them, and the rest, well, it's all them. 

It's enlightening and it's scary simultaneously. Literally to the bone. Enlightening because I couldn't be prouder of the strong, independent, no-nonsense, and empathetic humans they're becoming. Scary because of the world they're becoming all of this in. 

We live in a country that's always held the promise of equality, equity, liberty, and freedom for all, to live and be who we want, within the bounds of our constitution and bill of rights, regardless of our gender, our age, or our race and ethnicity. 

In practice, our history reveals again and again how beaten and bruised that promise has been. But we keep trying to get there, and there are those who keep trying to hold us back. I believe the majority is in the getting there, otherwise this grand democratic republic experiment would be over.

There have been those moments when the experiment teeters on the edge of authoritarianism, where ultimately unchecked power costs us our personal freedoms and works to require strict obedience to those in charge. I'm grateful to have been around the world with my wife and my children and not once have I thought, I do not want to live in a place without inclusive freedom. So, here we are today with our children/teenagers/soon-to-be adults (in a few years -- because time flies) in the middle of another divisive national election. 

What I've always loved about being an American is that, within our Constitution and Bill of Rights boundaries, we can all believe what we want and live the way we want. We may vehemently disagree on the current issues in front of us, but we still have the freedom to disagree, debate, and again, believe what we we want and live the way we want. Maybe along the way we learn to compromise and fully appreciate our shared experiences. At least that's always the aspirational goal and one we impart on our children. 

However, when the ultimate goal is to limit and even eliminate my family's personal freedoms and rights so that we must believe and live the way others want to us to, and compromise all that's afforded to us in the promise of America, then it's no longer an inclusive democratic republic. And here we are again, teetering on that razor's edge.

I have to believe that the majority of us, with or without children, will work together to keep our grand ol' democracy, with all its continuous contradictions, flaws, and historical scars, alive and well. I know my wife and I will. I hope our children will, too. 

Our youngest child, Bryce, a fiercely independent teen who's a little too cynical at this age, always asks why I keep our American flag out on our front porch. 

My response is aways the same (as was my parents), "Because I'm proud to be an American."