It's the Fourth! Hoo! Yah!

July 4, 2013. America's birthday. It's like no other holiday because it's ours. No gifts, no pressure, just fireworks,  BBQs, parades, flags, music, genuine patriotism, friendships. Just good times.  It's a time for our moral compasses to stop spinning and point towards hope for our country.  We celebrate every year of our beloved country. We celebrate those who fought and died to protect our freedom.

The Fourth of July is the biggest day of the year in Coronado. Coronado is a military town covering all decades of military history. The flags fly high. The parade is huge. Thousands invade our Island like the Marines at Iwo Jima. The parties and BBQs are plentiful. Love and peace all around.

It is too bad today's schools are either re-writing or ignoring history. History is fun. When I was doing my genealogy research, I paralleled it with the history of the times in which my ancestors lived.   This brought history to a closer personal level. My major lines became English citizens when the came to America. All of my lines came before the Revolutionary War. The earliest in about 1634-36. A distant grandfather was at Valley Forge and Momouth as a drummer. My grandfather fought in the Spanish American War and the Philippine Insurrection. I became an expert in these wars, as well as Philippine history. It put me in the times. As I researched the history, I understand how this country expanded, one step at a time. I love history.

I grew up in the fifties. Many of the future generations mocked that fact as a Beaver Clever world. What's wrong with simpler times? Yes, we are all caught up in the technology of the times, me included. It was a time when the moral compass was relatively stable. What's wrong with that, I ask?

So let us all slow down and remember what a great country we live in.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!

Have a great patriotic day!

Samuel C. Arnold