This post’s featured image is me, approximately at the time of the Bicentennial. I’ve been thinking today that on the Tricentennial my son Nicholas will be 75 years old.
50-year markers aren’t how we usually think about things—except for every 50 years, I suppose. That depth of planning and consideration eludes most of us—for ourselves, for our loved ones, and for our country—beautiful Indigenous philosophy and principles notwithstanding.
Still, thinking about the Tricentennial of the United States today—on the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence—provides guidance, motivation, and inspiration.
We can hold on to that in the days to come, after the Semiquincentennial fireworks have exploded, fallen, and passed, and lift up ourselves and one another with it, too, with hopeful, kind, and visionary intention and determination.
Happy Fourth of July.
(The two photographs of me were taken by camp counselor Dale Hotaling at Camp Killooleet in Hancock, Vermont. I spent five 8-week summers there, from 1976 to 1980. Killooleet turns 100 in 2027—its very own centennial. You should send your kid. Or grandchild.)
I usually link to related content in this section, but the only related content I can think of this morning is a poem from 30 years ago with a Fourth of July mention: Boulevard Park, Bellingham.
