Not even Jesus

Chapter 338

The 4th of July

A great day. A great holiday. Even though there are no big fireworks displays tonight as there would have been in previous years. The pool was great with the grandkids and the frozen yogurt place was super and we had the place to ourselves, though I am still trying to figure out how three little people ate $30 worth of yogurt! But that can be the focus of another post another day perhaps.

Well there were lots of private fireworks booming last night. Lots of folks decided to take matters into their own hands and have a 4th of their own liking and making. It’s the American way. Compensate, innovate, find a way to make it happen. We can be some of the most pragmatic people on the planet. That gives us a mighty strength and a deadly weakness. It makes us blind to what others are going through and how they process and what they are feeling. Honestly it makes us jackasses to the rest of the world. And when we are here, that is generally ok, because that is how we generally are all the time.

But when we travel and live abroad in other countries, cultures and languages, it is terrible overall. This is not a chapter about Americans in a cross-cultural nightmare, but rather about Independence Day. For good or bad, no one is gonna tell us what to do for very long, it won’t be tolerated. Independent is the key word. Heck I even grew up with the religiously independent and that is wilder yet. No one can tell us what to do not even Jesus.