It’s a silly tradition. Every July 4th I send a message to my good friend who lives in Scotland.
Happy “Remember When My Ancestors Beat Your Ancestors In A War” day.
It’s a holiday here in the United States. A pretty important one at that. July 4th is Independence Day. The day we celebrate the birth of a nation. Only July 4th, 1776 a group of men in Philadelphia met and signed a document declaring the former British colonies would no longer be governed by Britain. We declared ourselves free and independent states.
It’s one thing to declare you are free and quite another to actually achieve it. Four years later, the most improbable of beginnings resulted in the formation of the United States of America. I have ancestors who fought in that war, just as my good friend has ancestors who fought on the other side. After 240 years, the genealogies are so mixed and muddled that I probably have ancestors that fought on the British side as well. Considering that my mother’s paternal grandfather was German, I may have ancestors who were the hired mercenaries for the British as well.
July 4th is such an important holiday in America that it’s one of the almost “required” days off. If your company offers any paid days off, July 4th is one of them. Today it’s on a Monday, but if it falls on a weekend as it did last year, the company still give you either the Friday before or the Monday after as a holiday.
If your company only works and deals with US customers, employees and suppliers then today is pretty much a full stop day. No one is working. It might as well still be Sunday. But, increasingly, that’s not how the world works. My company, for example, has it’s international headquarters in France. (We like the French, they helped us beat the British all those years ago.) Today, it’s Monday in France. Just the start of another work week. We have offices all over the world. I got an email this morning from a coworker in the Philipines who has completed a report showing the system availability for the month of June. He sent me the final report this morning. At least I think he’s in the Philipines. He might be in India. I’m not really sure. I work and talk with him often, but email knows no nationality. In the Philipines it’s just Monday and the day is nearly over.
So, here in America, we are taking the day off to enjoy BBQ and fireworks and for those with a little knowledge of history, a remembrance of men and women long dead who carved out a new nation. But, in the rest of the world it’s just a Monday.
To my friends in “the colonies,” happy Independance Day. To my friends in the rest of the world, happy Monday.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday at 7:00 AM Mountain Time. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
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