Proud To Be An American

As you all know, today is September 11. The 7th anniversary of that infamous day in American history. It was patriotic week at school and today was wear red, white, and blue day so I was driving to work this morning decked out in my native colors and my favorite song came on the radio. I turned it way up and sang "I'm Proud to be an America, where at least I know I'm free. And I won't forget the men who died, who gave that right to me. And I'll proudly stand up, next to you and defend her still today. Cause there ain't no doubt, I love this land, God Bless the USA!!" As I turned onto the road that takes me to school it was lined with American Flags. We had a flag raising ceremony (it is a new school so they raised the flag for this first time today) and the national guard was there with the bagpipes and everything. It was great. They raised the flag up then lowered it down to half staff to honor those who died. Concluding the ceremony was the cutest little first grade boy who sang "God Bless the USA" all by himself. I got to listen to those beautiful words once again and it was very touching listening to that boy sing them.
With all of this taking place I thought a lot about how I really am proud to be an American. I do love this land, regardless of how many things are politically or socially corrupt about it. Those things mean very little in the big scheme of things. I watched this show the other night (I actually watched it two nights in a row because it was on again and there was nothing else on and I was home alone coloring stuff for school) about a village in Africa.

The women woke up at 2 a.m. every morning and walked 4 hours, filled up their pails with water, and walked 4 hours back and began their daily domestic chores. 8 hours of walking just to get a pail of water! Imagine how tired you would be if you would be if you woke up at 2 a.m., walked 8 hours, and then worked all day under the hot African sun. Then they discovered that the water was making them sick, but it was the only water they could get to. Long story short they got a well & pump in their village and it changed their lives. WOW! I am proud to be an American. Where I can use as much water as I want and if it makes me sick-I can sue somebody. (I wouldn't though)
This is long enough so I will let you ponder yourself about all the many other reasons why we should stop complaining all the time and just be grateful for all that we have. We really have no idea how blessed we are just to live in this land.