250 Years: Chasing Excellence

On the 250th birthday of the United States of America, I find myself reflecting on my place in this country.

When I was a kid, the Fourth of July was simple. Hot dogs. Burgers. Cookouts. Fireworks. Sparklers. And, if you got a little older and a little more wild, trying to get your hands on an M-80.

That was America to me then. Family. Summer. Noise. Food. Light in the sky.

Then, in my 20s and 30s, the Fourth became more about community. It was about getting together with other Americans and celebrating our Americanism, whatever that meant to each of us at the time.

I lived abroad for a long time, and every Fourth of July, us Americans would search out each other. Because, on that day, I/we wanted to feel culturally connected to home.

Now I am back in the United States. I am 46 years old. And America has taken many different shapes in my mind.

I remember living abroad and hearing people say that America was changing. Then I came home and realized something strange. In many ways, my politics had stayed fairly consistent, like I was in a bubble outside of the USA and the conversation, but the country had shifted without me experiencing it. The political landscape, the culture, the values, the fights, the language, all of it was different. I was a time capsule.

So my 40s have become a period of personal discovery, but also political discovery. I have been trying to piece together my understanding of America from the past to the present. Where we were. Where we are. Where we need to go.

This country began with a bunch of scrappy 20 year olds trying to escape monarchy, choose their own leaders, create their own government, worship how they wanted, speak freely, and reject being ruled from across an ocean.

And now, 250 years later, we are 50 states. We are the world’s largest economy. We are a country built through struggle, conflict, discourse, celebration, victory, defeat, contradiction, and change.

America has never been one fixed thing.

A country is a living entity, shaped by millions of people, millions of arguments, millions of hopes, and millions of competing ideas about what it should become.

That is why the conversation matters. That is why we cannot back out. That is why we cannot bury our heads in the sand and hope everything works out.

We have to stay in it.

We have to keep doing the work. Showing up. And lending our voice.

Refuse to let the loudest people define the country for everyone else. Be part of the conversation.

So on America’s 250th birthday, I want to reflect on where we were, where we are, and where we need to go.

This has never been a straight path. It has never been a journey of perfection.

But as Vince Lombardi famously said, “Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.”

That is what I still believe America is supposed to be.

Not perfect, but chasing perfection.

Catching excellence when we can.

And I believe most Americans, in our own way, are still trying to do that.

Happy 250th, America.

Stay Angry and Hopeful