Happy Birthday, America, and thank you

I’m a product of the American story – descendant of pre-World War II immigrants on one side and of soldiers who fought in the Civil War on the other. Fort McHenry around Independence Day is a core childhood memory of mine: We were always moved by the curtain in the auditorium being swept open to reveal the lone, proud flag on a hill as the Star-Spangled Banner – composed right there by Francis Scott Key – boomed over the speakers, beautiful and strong and resolute.

The author’s children holding the flag at Fort McHenry, some years ago. (courtesy)

The America of the Founding Fathers is in my DNA, the tempo of liberty and free and radical ideas the soundtrack to my first steps, and it’s this America that I think of longingly from my home across the ocean. It’s the America of heroic trailblazers, of opportunity and freedom of expression, of county fairs with extra-large sodas and sticky buns and rickety roller coasters and cotton candy so huge you can’t see the face of the kid holding it.

It’s the hopeful fulfillment of the Great American Promise that says that so long as you’re respectful and moral, you will succeed here.

It’s this America that was inked into being during a hushed meeting at the signing of the Declaration of Independence, 249 years ago.

And it’s this America whose news I read, whose opinion I once held dear but now keep at arm’s length – because the brotherly love it professes, while still so much a part of its essence and history – has shown some erosion around the edges.

Stories such as this one about being detained by ICE and the current democratic candidate for NYC mayor have left myself and many Jews questioning — nay, knowing — what our loyalties are and where they should lie.

Jewish history is a textbook lesson, at once painful yet hopeful, that nothing lasts forever. The wheels of time and tyrants inevitably churn new realities into being, always surprising us, but never shocking us. Because this is not our first rodeo.

And I’m not that old, but the America of my youth is not the one I recognize today from afar.

The America of my youth allowed me to wear a Star of David with impunity.

The America of my youth had the world’s greatest entertainment industry, one that wasn’t riddled with fanatical personal opinions in the name of a farcical sort of freedom and a shocking number of people siding with terrorists. In the America of my youth, politics weren’t quite so polarizing and Blockbuster, not rallies, was the best place to go on a Saturday night.

Now, from across the world, I watch my birth country shaking, trembling, birthing a new generation that does not recognize liberty for what it is but uses liberty as a means to support those who would kill them if given the chance. In this new generation, life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are becoming more about the pursuit of victimizing the villains and realigning values to fit what’s in style. And while I do think the country will eventually right itself, we Jews know better than to wait around for that to happen.

But I’m putting that aside this 4^th of July.

The America of my youth, the America of my nostalgic thoughts, will be honored with grilled hot dogs and a red, white, and blue cake that I hope to make for Shabbat.

This 4^th of July, I pay tribute to the country that was built on values held true for millennia by the Jewish people, and whose current events can be encapsulated in these words from the great orator, activist, and patriot, Martin Luther King, Jr.:

Now, I’m just happy that God has allowed me to live in this period, to see what is unfolding. . . . Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it doesn’t matter with me now. Because I’ve been to the mountaintop. . . .

I just want to do God’s will. And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain.

And I’ve looked over.

And I’ve seen the promised land.

This 4^th of July, I’m still proud to be an American and thankful for holding an American passport. And I’m also thankful for the timeless and timely lessons the Jewish people are learning as we live, yet again, through making history.

Nothing lasts forever – now pass the mustard, please.