If you are like Mike Long, Brian Ruth, and many of the other folks on Grand Lake, Independence Day means it is time to celebrate the day our country came into its own by blowing some *&%$@ up.
Nothing else can excite the soul like a great fireworks show. With this in mind it is not surprising that Americans import over $200 million worth of fireworks from China each year. It would not surprise me if at least 1% of those fireworks will be exploded right here on Grand Lake. Love it!
This year we will celebrate the 232nd anniversary of our founding fathers signing the Declaration of Independence. This act set the original 13 colonies on the road to national sovereignty and laid the foundation for the lives we enjoy here in America today.
“I am whatever you make me, nothing more. I am your belief in yourself, your dream of what a people may become…. I am the clutch of an idea, and the reasoned purpose of resolution. I am no more than you believe me to be and I am all that you believe I can be. I am whatever you make me, nothing more.” Franklin Knight Lane
In 1776 we had 2.5 million people living in our newly independent nation. Today over 300 million people are living in America. The incredible growth that has taken place only highlights how much things have changed in such a short period of time, 232 years. Our founding fathers were wise to create a Constitution that is not only very complex, but at the same time broad in scope. The foresight of these men gives us an opportunity to interpret the greatest law in our land in a way that is adaptable and relevant to our changing nation. The choices that we make today will determine whether or not our country will be able to provide a healthy and meaningful environment for future generations of Americans and set a continued example for the rest of the world.
“My God! How little do my countrymen know what precious blessings they are in possession of, and which no other people on earth enjoy!” Thomas Jefferson
When Benjamin Franklin was helping to shape the Constitution he could not have known that we would become the greatest military force on the planet. That we would put a man on the Moon, and, at the time of this writing, analyze in real-time minerals and soil on Mars. How could he have known about the Internet’s ability to share information at the speed of light? It took Ben over three months traveling by sea to get a message to France.
Thomas Jefferson could not have foreseen that the average American would be producing 52 tons of garbage by the time they reached 75 years of age in 2008. In his day people bought their food in the local market often packaged in materials that could be reused for quilts or clothing. Back then people traveled days or perhaps weeks by horseback, stagecoach, or train. The idea that over 28,000 planes would be flying through the friendly skies each day taking people all across this country and around the world and would be using over 2 million plastic cups every 12 hours was out of the realm of possibility.
James Wilson could not have conceived that Americans would drink water from over 2 million plastic bottles ever 5 minutes since water in those days was pumped from wells in and round their towns. He could not have predicted that we would be using cell phones to communicate with each other in real-time anywhere in the world, disposing of 426,000 cell phones every day so that we could keep up with the modern technological advances of the day. Communication in those days was by horse messengers like Paul Revere and mail took weeks if not months instead of days to arrive at its destination.
John Adams would have been laughed at if he had suggested that Americans would shop so much that they would go through over 60,000 plastic bags every 5 seconds, or that office workers would print over 15 million sheets of paper every 5 minutes of every day.
Things have changed a lot since the Declaration of Independence was signed 232 years ago. The amount of change that American has experienced in the past 232 years is phenomenal. What is even more amazing is the fact that in the last 40 years there have been more changes than all the changes that took place before the late 1960’s. This is a wake up call to the level of accelerated change that we can expect to see going forward in the months and years ahead.
“Today the world changes so quickly that in growing up we take leave not just of youth but of the world we were young in.” Peter Medawar
Our country has been an inspiration to the rest of the world. We have inspired a world to live the American dream, a dream that has fueled some of the greatest inventions and a spirit of giving that the world has never seen before. We have promoted this dream and excited countries and people worldwide who want what we have been so good at creating. Think about China for just a minute. At the current rates of purchasing there will be 1.3 billion cars in China by 2015. To put this into perspective there are only 800 million cars operating in the entire world today. It will take half of China’s rice fields to be turned into roads to handle this number of cars, and India, with its 1.1 billion people, is working just as hard to capture and live the American Dream.
We are blessed to live in this country, and with these blessings come the same kind of responsibility and influence of our founding fathers. If we are to leave an America to our children like the one we have experienced we are all going to have to change. Besides taxes, change is the only thing we can count on for sure.
This year as you are watching the fireworks bursting in the sky over Grand Lake think about the kinds of changes you would like to create to insure a healthy and meaningful life for you and that of others in your community. You have the power within you to do anything to which you set your mind and heart. You have unlimited potential and so does America!
“It is not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.” Author unknown
Let me know what you think.
Until next week, remember the only boxes that exist are the ones you create yourself.
