by TerranceDC

I knew as soon as the California Supreme Court marriage ruling
was posted, that I would read the whole thing. I started reading it at
my desk, after it was posted, but stopped once got to the "bottom line"
of the ruling — and, truly, because as I realized what I was reading,
and what the California Supreme Court had said, the emotion was too
much.

I wasn't born when the Brown v. Board of Education
ruling was handed down, so I don't know what it was like for those
Black Americans who heard it or read it and realized what the court had
done. But I think I have an idea, based on what I felt yesterday after
reading the decision.

I know it was a state supreme court decision, and one that doesn't
apply to me all the way over here on the other side of the country. But
yesterday, reading the decision, I felt a little bit more like an American. And maybe even just a little proud of my country.

This is something I meant to write at the time, but that occurred to
me yesterday, as I was walking home. Reading the CA Supremes ruling
yesterday, and thinking about my own feelings, I thought about Michelle
Obama's comments about finally being proud of America. I understood what she meant even then, but more-so after yesterday's ruling.

Yesterday, I finally felt just a little proud to be an American. Finally.

To understand where someone like Michelle Obama is coming from — or
yours truly, for that matter — you have to look a America through the
prism of someone without the privileges upon which it was founded from the beginning; from the perspective of people for whom the promises of being an American in America have been historically held out of reach.

From that perspective, pride in America is based more on its strides towards what it could
become — were it to live up to all it promises to be on paper, for all
its citizens — what it is or where it is at the present moment. America
is something different for, say, Cindy McCain than is is for Michelle
Obama, or than it is for me.

In some ways, we're proud of an America that has yet to be, and that we hope will be someday. Langston Huges probably said it best.

Let America be America again. Let it be the dream it used to be. Let
it be the pioneer on the plain Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed-- Let it be that great
strong land of love Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme That
any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty Is crowned with no false
patriotic wreath, But opportunity is real, and life is free, Equality
is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me, Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark? And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

…O, let America be America again-- The land that never has been
yet-- And yet must be--the land where every man is free. The land
that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME-- Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain, Whose hand at the foundry,
whose plow in the rain, Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose-- The steel of freedom does
not stain. From those who live like leeches on the people's lives, We
must take back our land again, America!

O, yes, I say it plain, America never was America to me, And yet I swear this oath-- America will be!

People who point to Michelle Obama's privileged lifestyle forget that whether her current lifestyle was always her lifestyle, she grew up a black child and became a black woman in the America that was and is, not the America that will be. (Perhaps it's safer to say the America that can be.) She has almost surely seen much to make one less than proud. And, as I remember the pictures of her reunion with her South Carolina relatives
— having grown up in the south myself — I know she must have relatives
who have witnessed much that wouldn't inspire pride, and she's listened
to their stories.

From her perspective, how much hope must be inspired by the reality
that her husband is the first black (or brown) man to have a real shot
at becoming president? How much hope that wasn't there before? How much
hope that was nursed, unfulfilled for generations, until this moment?
How much hope, nursed on an abiding faith that American can be — will
be — all it has promised to be, someday?

I was a high school student when the Bowers v. Hardwick decision came down. As a gay person, I felt divorced from the constitution and my country. It wasn't until Lawrence v. Texas
that anything changed for me, and by then I'd seen and heard much that
didn't inspire pride. But something shifted a little yesterday, and now
I have a "wait-and-see" attitude.

Peggy Noonan recently asked "Who would have taught Barrack Obama to
love his country?" My experience is that plenty of people will tell you
that you should love your country, and will speak at length about why.
But depending on who you are, you may learn to love your country, but
experience will have taught you to sometimes love it — and hold it — at
arms' length.

If I feel pride, it's not the same as might be expected, but closer to what Booman said.

Where did I learn to love my country? Who taught me to love it? What
did I find loveable? I'm not even sure of the answer, although my
parents and my teachers and the programs I watched on television and
the books I chose to read all played a part. I learned to love the
Constitution of the United States. I learned to respect and admire the
Founding Fathers of this country, despite all their flaws. I came to
understand that our Republic was something new and fragile, and that it
needed protection from both within and without. And I, of course,
learned to love the area that I grew up in, and all the wonderful
national parks around the country that I visited during summer
vacations as a child. And I loved baseball and football, and mint
chocolate chip ice cream. In other words, I learned to love my country
the same way that Barack Obama learned to love it...by growing up here
and learning a little history.

…I'll tell you another thing. I don't normally get my pride and my
love off of the accomplishments of others. I do have pride and love for
our Constitution and our system of governance, but my love of country
has nothing to do with the gold miners that forced the Native Americans
off their land in violation of treaties, nor with the Nazi-sympathizer
Henry Ford, nor even with the enterprising Wright Brothers. I'm all for
clean-running trains, planes, and automobiles, but I don't love my
country because of them. I wouldn't die for my country to preserve the
internal combustion engine. I'd die to preserve the Constitution. And
by Constitution, I do not mean the Estate Tax, Peggy. Or whatever other
supply-side economic policy you think made it possible for Americans to
figure out air travel.

Yesterday, I heard a whisper of an America that never was to me, and
that I hope will be. Inspired now, I will work harder to make it so.

Crossposted from The Republic of T.