Veering For Sure, But Veering Back
July 4th, 230 years later
If the President uses his annual State of the Union speech before Congress as a kind of report-card, then the 4th of July seems the perfect time for we citizens to chip in our opinions?
It’s a day of sunburns, over-stimulated small children, dads in shorts lining the parade route with their youngest on their shoulders and the old folks arranged in the front row, their lawn-chairs dotting the curb along Main Street. There will be lawn-mower drill-teams, a Model-A roadster or two and someone’s lovingly restored Packard convertible.
Flags borne by blonde cowgirls on skittish palominos, the mayor in a ’38 Buick, floats pulled by tractors, pickups full of jazz quartets and queens of this and that, fill out the first couple of blocks. Then come the kids on bikes, red, white and blue crepe-paper woven in the spokes. The VFW will march and more than a few will hobble, but they will be there, paying tribute to a country they fought for. The high-school band will do their…