America’s New Birth Day?

I’ve always loved the 4th of July. Fireworks are high on my list of top 10 favorite things. (Also, it’s the birthday of my best friend of more than 40 years.) Fireworks are cancelled this year here in Marina del Rey. And that’s a meaningful symbol to me. Obviously, we don’t want crowds in an airborne-virus pandemic.

But, just as obviously, America needs to recalculate before we celebrate ourselves again. Where are we in the process of forming a more perfect union? The new generations are reckoning with our Original Sin, and facing with vigor our systemic racism.

I watch them in the streets (wait—was I not out there already—in the 70’s? 80’s? 90’s?)

I hear Teddy Kennedy’s words in my head: “For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die.”

These are gut-wrenching times. Are we moving toward a new Birth Day for our country? I have faith in the millennials. They produced a Lin-Manuel Miranda, who wrote Hamilton the musical. And they have blown us all away.

There is much work to be done. Turn out the vote. The song in my head that motivates me is from The Who: “Won’t Get Fooled Again.” You will love the full 8-minute version.

Here are just a few of the lyrics—they are all apropos.

“I’ll tip my hat to the new constitution

We don’t get fooled again.”

I say: Let us continue the work.

[Photo Credit: Renee Jones Schneider/Star Tribune]