Celebrating America's birthday in small-town USA

While America's capital is engaged in phenomenal spectacles and events to celebrate her 250th birthday, hundreds of millions of Americans are celebrating in small towns across this wide nation. We were privileged to be among them.

It's about a half-hour drive to the nearest town, and this modest place went all-out to celebrate Independence Day.

Every flag pole, every store front, every hand rail was adorned with flags and bunting.

As we walked the Main Street of the town, we saw benches set up for the convenience of those who would be watching the parade, due to start at 2 pm.

In other places, people had lined up picnic chairs in anticipation of the parade.

Patriotic signs where everywhere.

One store had put out a container of sidewalk chalk and invited kids to express themselves, which I thought was sweet.

We ducked into the local Veteran's Center where a three-piece band was belting out an outstanding version of "Johnny Be Good."

The city park was set up with booths selling everything from honey to crafts to books to soaps. It was a hot day, so the park was just a nice place for many people to hang around in the shade.

Lots of patriotic clothing.

By pure chance, we found a place to watch the parade in the shade with our pastor and his wife and toddler. People lined the street, waiting for the show to start.

Many kids carried bags, since a lot of the parade participants throw candy to the crowds.

Here's Mrs. Pastor and her toddler waiting for things to get started.

(By the way, Mrs. Pastor is expecting their second child, also a son, in October.)

Some kids waved flags.

The parade started, and somehow it just embodied the best of small-town America. Lots of cheering and applause for veterans, rodeo queens, classic cars, local businesses, emergency services (ambulances, fire, paramedics, etc.), tractors and other farm implements, and all the other components that help make a town function.

This being rural Idaho, there were lots of horses.

Many of the horses had glitter or sparkly stencils on their rumps.

The local Quilts of Valor exhibit.

And what's a parade without royalty?

A local gymnastics group showed up in full force. Every thirty seconds or so, at the sound of a whistle, they would all do a cartwheel. Honestly, by this point (we were near the end of the parade route), the girls looked pretty tired. That's a mile of cartwheels, after all.

Many times we didn't even know what certain vehicles represented. All we knew was they added to the chaotic fun and everyone was having a good time.

This is the local high school's extremely modest marching band. Despite their lack of numbers, they belted out tunes with great enthusiasm. 

Nothing like a little death-metal garage band on a flatbed truck to showcase a variety of talent. Not my genre, but they were actually quite decent.

Let's not forget a salute to the people who feed this nation.

Or who harvest its timber for our building needs.

We saw a really cool series of flatbed trucks carrying various ordinary people. Are you ready for this? These were high school class reunions. This is the class of 2016 (10 yr reunion).

The class of 1996.

The class of 1986.

And – drum roll, please - the class of 1976, America's bicentennial. This float got a huge round of cheers as it passed.

What this day of festivities conspicuously lacked was some of the chaos taking place in larger urban areas, such as the teen takeovers plaguing various cities. Instead, it was just a lot of people gathering together to celebrate and have fun. Honestly, it was as fine a Fourth of July as we ever had.

Tonight Don and I plan to watch a livestream of the fireworks in Washington D.C., as well as some of the other celebrations such as the aircraft flyovers and the parade of tall sailing ships from all over the world.

Happy birthday, America!

Happy Birthday, America!

Back in 1976 – America's bicentennial – I was 13 years old and in 8th grade. I wasn't overly fond of my math teacher, but I will give her credit for something I've always remembered: She took us on a field trip to see the Bicentennial Freedom Train when it landed either in California's Bay Area or in Sacramento (I don't remember where we went). Any other folks out there remember this patriotic marvel?

Somewhere, too, I still possess a small bicentennial pin bearing this logo. Does it look familiar to anyone?

For more memories of 1976, here is a short documentary:

And, for good measure, a Coke commercial:

Now here we are, fifty years later, celebrating America's semiquincentennial

Presumably I won't be around for this nation's 300th anniversary, but I hope it will be a good one. Happy birthday, America!

Money troubles: Truth or fiction?

Recently, Daisy Luther ("The Organic Prepper") wrote a piece entitled "Seven Lies People with Money Problems Tell Themselves."

She distinguishes between those who are just in a rough patch (hey, it happens to everyone) and those who are perpetually in a downward financial spiral. It's the "downward spiral" people she's addressing. "These lies are very common, and they can keep you trapped in a bad situation for a very long time," she writes.

She lists the seven lies as follows:

• It's not my fault. ("Taking personal responsibility for your mistakes is the first step toward setting things right. Nearly every financial situation could have been different if a different series of decisions had been made.")
• It's just this once. ("Whether you’re buying something frivolous on your credit card, going out to dinner because you don’t feel like cooking, or take some other shortcut, it’s really never 'just this once.'")
• My children shouldn't know we're having money problems. ("You need to consider that living in a glowing perfect world where every bill payment is met with ease and budgets don’t seem to exist – things just magically work out – that’s a fairy tale. And if they grow up believing in that fairy tale, you are setting them up for a life of difficulty.")
• Paying off debt is always the most important thing. ("If you are in a bad situation financially, there are lots of things you should be paying before you exceed the minimum payment on your debts.")
• You have to have a credit card to get by in this world. ("It’s far from a necessity, especially if you have a debit card with the Mastercard or Visa logo on it.")
• I deserve a treat. ("This is one of the most dangerous financial lies out there. If you believe that budget be d*mned, you have had a bad day and you deserve that treat regardless, you’re treading into dangerous territory.")
• Money doesn't buy happiness. ("Money makes your life easier, more comfortable, and less stressful. And while that isn’t a recipe for joy, it sure does help make room in your life for seeking those things that make you truly happy.")

(Deeper explanations for each point can be found in the article.)

While Daisy makes exceptions for things that are out of one's control – such as catastrophic illness or injury – in other respects she puts financial hardship squarely in the laps of individuals. To be fair, it sounds like she knows what she's talking about. In her past, she's hit periods of economic rock-bottom, including losing her home to foreclosure, losing her car to repossession, and dumpster diving to feed her kids.

Daisy emphasizes changing one's mindset as an aid toward climbing out of the pit of economic instability. Certainly it's a tool in the toolbox.

But has she gone too far? Are those experiencing economic difficulties largely to blame themselves? What are your thoughts?

"Idaho destroyed today"

Over the weekend, Southern Idaho got slammed by severe storms that resulted in widespread flooding and associated damage. I did a quick search on YouTube for more information and saw a lot of dramatic footage.

The trouble with searching for anything on YouTube, however, is the algorithm then assumes you want to see more and more on that particular subject ... which is why I was so amused to see this ridiculous clickbait video pop up: "Idaho destroyed today!"

The video showed legitimate footage of the storm, so perhaps it's more accurate to say the featured image was clickbait. Ahem, notice the preponderance of palm trees and dramatic hurricane-level flooding in the image. In Idaho. The last time Idaho was hit by a hurricane was, well, never.

Ah, artificial intelligence.....

The season of white flowers

We are having a bonanza of white flowers blooming lately.

At the moment, the most ubiquitous are the daisies. Honestly, these are some of my favorite flowers, so much so that I had them in my wedding bouquet.

This is dog fennel (Anthemis cotula). The flowers are similar to that of daisies, but they're smaller and the plant is stinkier (it's sometimes called "stinking chamomile"). Many years ago, my parents came to visit us, and my mother (who had a wonderful green thumb) was enchanted by the dog fennel and wanted to collects its seeds to plant at home. I warned her it would spread. She went home, looked it up, and agreed not to plant dog fennel.

Oceanspray. At our old place, it grew everywhere and was stunning when in bloom. Here we have far less, so every shrub is appreciated.

Elderberries. This particular (bush? tree?) is located on an embankment near the river. In the fall when the berries are ripe, the road-facing side is stripped bare and the river-facing side is left alone, because no one can reach the fruit.

Yarrow.

Mock orange (also called syringa), the state flower of Idaho.

White iris. We have a clump of these growing just inside our pasture fence.

Bind-weed, a type of wild morning glory.

The blackberries are in full bloom. I don't recall ever seeing this many full blossoms. We're going to be inundated with blackberries in late summer.

This is due in large part to the enormous number of bees and other pollinators busy at work.

And of course – though really, this is cheating – the seeds of dandelions. Hey, they're white.

With a few exceptions, there aren't a lot more flowers expected to bloom from here on out. Instead, the seeds and fruits are growing.