Let's recap some recent history. The United States' national debt is over $13 trillion. (It helps if you put that gargantuan number in perspective: $13 trillion divides out to roughly $120,000 per taxpayer, or $43,000 per citizen.) Labor Day was certainly nothing to celebrate, considering the national unemployment increased to 9.6 percent in the month of August. BP just announced that the cost for the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico has risen another $2 billion. And because reality television is apparently determined to reach the ninth circle of Dante's Inferno, Bristol Palin, and supposedly Levi Johnston as well, will be gracing our TV screens with their high-definition presences this fall.
This is not what we call a glamorous time in America's relatively young life. We certainly will not win any endearing monikers like "the Golden Age." At least during my two decades on this planet, it seems like life has been an endless series of disastrous screw-ups (some manmade, some not) and haphazard patch-ups. In the quality of life surveys, the U.S. is still struggling to break into the top 10. In a 2005 ranking by The Economist magazine, we were nestled snugly at 13, between Finland and Canada.
Yet in the midst of this misery, I will unabashedly pronounce in the most clichéd of terms: I am still incredibly proud to be an American.
It is a revelation that struck me this weekend when I was in Washington, D.C. for an interview. I had some free time left at the end of the day, so I set out to aimlessly explore the city. My wandering led me along the banks of the National Mall to the World War II Memorial, where I sat with my feet in the fountain and just let the surroundings sink in. The paradox of the situation was striking: a place that was built to mourn the dead was buzzing with life and activity. But then I realized that the dichotomy of the scene essentially defined the identity of our nation. Life emerging from ashes. Triumph rising from defeat.
Say what you want about American policies and politics and problems. I truly mean it. Dissent is the spark that propelled our nation into existence in the first place. Differences of opinion have and will continue to move us forward. Our nation is far from perfect. Anyone who believes differently is going to experience an enormous shock as America becomes even more tightly knit in the web of 21st century globalization. Luckily, our founding fathers had the foresight to know that creating a country of stasis is government suicide. The success of our system hinges on the fact that we have the ability to recognize weaknesses and amend them. Our country is a living organism, and as its citizens we get to shape its maturation and growth. Hundreds of thousands of Americans, their valiant efforts etched in stone, have fought bitterly to protect that right.
It helped that my realization dawned only a few days before Sept. 11. Because, from one perspective, the people who died on that day in 2001 were soldiers too. They may not have been fighters in the traditional sense, but they were murdered because they were Americans. They chose to live here and work here and embrace this country (including its flaws), and they were killed because of that choice.
So here is my call to you. This Saturday, there will be myriad ways to commemorate the anniversary of Sept. 11. I urge you to find something — anything — that helps you define what it means to be an American. It's a personal choice: I let my toes prune in a pool, basking in the memories of a generation who, as WWII Admiral Chester Nimitz said, "fought together as brothers-in-arms … died together and now … sleep side by side."
It doesn't matter exactly what you do. But in the midst of all the controversy and conflict in our country, it helps to mediate, if only briefly, on the reason why we go through it all in the first place. Remind yourself why you are lucky to be an American, because that identity should always be something worth fighting for.
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