Flag Day June 14, 2014

     In a column published July 6, 1970 and then included in her book, I Lost Everything in the Post-Natal Depression, Erma Bombeck wrote about the American Flag.  She wrote because of something she had seen on television.  A group students and New York construction workers had an altercation and part of it involved the American flag.  The students referred to the American flag as the construction workers flag and symbol.  What struck Erma Bombeck most was the students did not think of the flag as their flag or symbol.
    As a parent, I guess I always thought respect for the flag was congenital. Is it possible I was so busy teaching the basics, I never took the time to teach “flag.”

     She included in her column a few well known quotes along with her own words about what she was saying to her children instead of teaching "flag".

“Oh say can you see by the dawn’s early light.…”

(Don’t slouch. Pick up your feet. Don’t talk with food in your mouth. Stop squinting. Turn that radio down. Get off the phone. Tie that shoestring before you trip on it.”)

     She then ended with these words:

Did I forget to tell them it was their flag they hoisted over Mount Suribachi? Their flag that flies over champions at the Olympics? Their flag that draped the coffin of John F. Kennedy? Their flag that was planted in the windless atmosphere of the moon? It’s pride. It’s love. It’s goose bumps. It’s tears. It’s determination. It’s a torch that is passed from one generation to another.

I defy you to look at it and tell me you feel nothing.

    I remember standing up in school, putting my hand over my heart and saying the Pledge of Allegiance while looking at the flag.  I remember watching a "floating flag" moving across the arena at a Florida Panthers hockey game.  I am always filled with  pride and respect at the sight of the American flag.  Pride because it symbolizes the best we can be, even when we forget.  Respect for all who fought in wars to gain our freedom, preserve our Union and protect our freedom. 

     What does the American Flag mean to you?

(The link is to the online text of Erma Bombeck's book.  Scroll down toward the end to read Flag)