Trying to find something great about America after 200 years, 50 years ago

Growing up, the 4th of July usually meant two things. There would be fireworks along with all the sack races and snow cones at the high school football field, and my Dad would be working the fireworks stand for very long hours.

The last time I experienced these events was in 2005. As usual, my Dad was working the fireworks fundraiser stand that benefited what eventually became the Kings/Tulare County Commission on Aging.

My Uncle Harold had surgery at the time and my Dad was preparing for his own when he was finished with the fireworks stand. That’s my oldest daughter Emily with me at the fireworks show and my Dad managed to squeeze into the side of that last photo when we were lighting off fireworks with the Mattos family across the street..

That was the last time we saw Uncle Harold before he died that year.

But the 4th of July is about much more than fireworks and fundraising for a country like ours. Today, people need to be onboard with what it is we are doing as a country and a society, in order to truly celebrate our existence in a positive way.

This year, many people suffered through the celebration of a once-in-a-lifetime, 250 year anniversary national event, that couldn’t have been less American. Perhaps we can look at the history of the holiday and understand why it creates so much trouble and tension for us today.

The American Revolution was about power and who had enough of it to win a war if one began between England, its Colonists, and all the European countries trying to takeover the land.

More than fire power was needed to create America—people power was needed. The political stuff. The “American People” needed to believe they existed as a real and cohesive group that could defeat what they believed to be a tyrant king before they would put their lives on the line.

Two of the biggest contributors to this effort to achieve American peoplehood were Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson. Franklin’s editorial cartoon JOIN, or DIE., America’s first political MEME) helped rally the Colonists early.

Jefferson wrote history’s most famous breakup letter.