That's How it Is, Sometimes, America

    First of all, I know some take umbrage when we United States citizens refer to ourselves as Americans and and our country as America, at the expense of Canada, Mexico, Central and South America. They can be Americans, too, both North and South Americans. Got it.

    Sorry. But we, the United States of America, are the entities of America, not of Canada, Mexico (as named in Spanish), or El Salvador or Guatemala. 

    Anyway, we are a great, big country, and most of us are supremely blessed to be a part of it. We are certainly not Gaza, or West Bank, or Israel, or anything else, from Europe or Asia and on.

    We are the current greatest power, and as such we wield much power and weight.

    I walked under a flag of ours Friday on my way to work, on a pole that is quite tall, maybe 30 or even 40 feet tall. It look, for lack of a better word, crumpled and stuck up there. Not flowing, or unfurled and floating, but wedged in on itself. Not at its best.

    This happens to a flag, and to our country, as a metaphor, right? We, as a nation, can be crumpled and less than our optimal best. We are in government shut down now. Some people are hurting, not able to go to work. Others are working but are furloughed, and unlike in times past may not even get back pay.

    This is painful, hard to swallow and absorb. For those government and contract workers, and those others that rely on their services and money, it can affect so many. The congress is debating about health care, which is the primary hold up in the budget argument, to pass the bills to get everything moving.

    We have entered wars and made a crumple of things. Whole nations go under the surgeon's knife of our operations and strategies... Not always the best results.

    War is painful, for sure. Harsh consequences, like radical surgery that can remove limbs or curtail lives.

    The crumpled American flag.

    That is how it is sometimes, America.

    Humanity. The world. Life. Even the animals and plants have these issues. Even without us.