Grief and healing and why I love this country

People dear to me have endured a lot just to have the privilege of living in this country. They are survivors, not just of a dangerous journey to come but of the cruelty of their own countries’ governments who pushed so hard as to uproot them.

Being uprooted is not the worst, if you choose to, as I did. I don’t want to imagine being forced to flee from war or terrorism, or Socialism. I left a place that was being consumed but is still there.

The experience of moving to a different country has ups and downs but I can honestly say I wouldn’t have thought it better.

My own extended family has a history of resettling in this great country dating to the 1950s. And although I haven’t formally interviewed any of them to ask, I attribute the successes and good lives they’ve had to their hard work and will to become part of and fully embrace the culture. They became their new place and loved it so it became their own.

One of the things that I find most beautiful when I walk the streets of my new city is how proudly folks display the national flag. Old Glory is a symbol of people working hard, finding new frontiers of land and science, founding beautiful cities and creating beautiful works of art and architecture.

It is also a symbol of starting small and overcoming hardship.

All of those values will prove very useful in the coming months.