As a country, we seem to be in kind of a shit storm right now. I feel like every group is rightfully angry or scared about something and is being vocal about it, and we’re all screaming, or quietly affirming, or firmly declaring as our beliefs and level of emotion require. It feels chaotic and overwhelming, and although I’m trying to be a good citizen and sort and sift through it all and be supportive, I don’t feel very effective. So I am clinging to something Bono of U2 often says about us. He loves America as an idea. He says it at every concert I’ve been to. He pumps us all up on being Americans, and then he specifically inserts the needed realism that as an idea we’re great. We haven’t yet achieved what the idea is capable of. But the idea of equality, the idea of freedom, the ability to fight for these things in our society, even among ourselves, is something worth appreciating and worth preserving.
We’ve had shit storms before and we’ll have them again. Let’s find a way to keep it together. Happy Fourth.
sandradeden.com 
Nice articulation of our current state of the union. Shitstorm indeed!
Thank you, I appreciate that very much. I’m going to be doing lots of yoga to cope…