Friday, July 04, 2008

Fourth of July Funk


Maybe it's because I'm burning up with a fever and my whole body aches. Or maybe it's because my husband is not from this country. Or maybe it's a Black thing, but for whatever the reason, I can't get excited about the Fourth of July. My poor kids have no idea that today is even a holiday!

When I was little I loved decorating my bike for the neighborhood Fourth of July parade and going to the park for games and of course fireworks at night. But now that I'm a grown up, all I can think about is the fact that My People didn't go free on Independence Day. In fact, many of them fought the British with the idea that they would be free, only to have to wait almost 100 more years for their own independence.

Maybe this is the fever making me surly. But I'm wondering, how do other people of ethnic backgrounds in this country celebrate the Fourth of July?

2 comments:

glamah16 said...

Funny. I'm kind of in the same mood. We went to wedding on July 4th. An Ecadorian and a white man as American as you can get. My German was fascinated. He would have prefered my black famlies BBQ and the leftovers. While trolling through the blogs today I see all these pictures of the 4th and they are very white middle class American and festive. In Chicago unfortunately they always want to point out the shootings and such that are done on the South side on the 4th. Recent incidents havent helped. Gang shooting at the Taste of Chicago. So yeah, I dont get to excited about the 4th.

nyc/caribbean ragazza said...

hmmm. I just posted about this very subject the other day.

Here in Italy is was just another day. On Saturday some expat group was throwing an Independence day party complete with American food. I forget how much it cost. I went to the beach. It was too hot in the city.