Stars and Stripes and Colonialism
and also the fulfilling nature of time with family
Hello readers!
I told you I wouldn’t be back in your inboxes until later this week, but here I am, just popping in to say, “Hi, how was your holiday weekend?” after settling back into home and finding myself excited to write this morning. I have really conflicted feelings about the 4th of July and the colonial nature of the holiday, the same as I do about Thanksgiving. BUT, this is the one time every year my brother and sister-in-law and their kids are back in Wisconsin at a time that I’m available for a visit, so I always tell myself I’m celebrating our family and not our country’s brutal and tragic theft of land.
I understand that the fourth is about celebrating the colonies’ independence from England, but how do we reconcile the fact that those colonies only existed because colonists violently took over land that originally was being utilized by others? The irony of celebrating independence that was only won while oppressing others makes it hard for me to embrace the nature of the holiday.