Of the USA in which I Used to Trust

It is not the country I grew up in

Photo by Lee Lawson on Unsplash

(Full disclosure: I started this article for a prompt by one of the Medium pubs I love to write for. But it doesn’t accept political articles, and I had to be political when thinking about issues of trust, the subject of its prompt.)

I was a child of the 1960s and 70s. At that time, there were plenty of angry protests about the Vietnam War, civil rights, women’s rights. And now, I look back and greatly appreciate that people were brave enough to protest what they believed was very wrong about the country.

There were, of course, consequences. In particular, those standing up for civil rights encountered fire hoses, dogs, imprisonment, even death. Vietnam protests saw the Kent State killings of four students by the Ohio National Guard. And sadly, those who served in the war returned to little appreciation for their sacrifices. Women were mocked and belittled.

But I was a kid. Although I was somewhat bothered by the features I watched on Walter Cronkite’s news report with my family, I was focused on enjoying school (I was a good student, and my teachers liked me) and playing with friends in my neighborhood.