Roots In The Mud

I guess I've always been a kind of anti-roots guy. I mean, I've never been much interested in my family roots any further back than I've met people. I have only a very vague memory of any "great grandfathers" or anything like that. I was never interested in the "great" anybodies of my family tree unless I'd met them. I always felt peculiar when people at large would wax eloquent about "the old country" or "celebrate" their heritage with special holidays (not shared with the general population) and wear colorful, funny costumes from antiquity or from foreign lands. I don't imagine that I'm the "quintessential American" but I think it may be true that that's all I am, just an American in the melting pot. I don't care or know anything about Irish or Scotch or English or Norwegian or anything else that may be in my blood. The time I've spent discussing such things with other family members is extremely limited. I have liked some of my family members very much, but I have never linked that to racial or familial types, just luck. I would not be surprised or jarred to discover that there are horse rustlers in my family tree. But I don't know of any, either.

I don't want to find out if I should be fond of banjos or wearing a beret or a set of kilts or dancing around a peon's hat or dreaming of conquering dragons in big goofy hats and loose pantaloons! I'm just me, and it's no great prize! I am myself, the son of my parents, my sister's crazy brother, and I'll have to do. I am just not swoon-ish or overly-impressed about my blood-type or my skin-tone or my ancestors who were generations of--whut? Carpenters? Sea-going men? Iron-mongers? Coal-diggers? Farmers? Cotton-pickers? It would be vaguely interesting, but not more so than a quick documentary on the History Channel. I don't spend any time proposing that us white guys are better than you not-white guys. Or that Americans are better than Europeans. Puh-leeze, gimme a break!

I find that the great thing about America is that I have been allowed to be rootless, to be this curmudgeon without costume or ideology. Maybe if I'd been of Jewish or Negro or Arab descent, I'm be more conscious of all that--if the world had ever been prejudiced against me day after day, hour after hour! But how can I know, when I'm none of those thing, and have also known examples from each of those groups who also were not avid about it?

I'm this blond or brown-haired person of indeterminate features and lineage. You say you're good at figuring such things out? Well, don't bother me about it, go read somebody else's palm and charge them 50 bucks! Me, I don't even like to join clubs. Nor am I interested in my home-town's booster groups. When I do join anything, I exult in the fact that we are diverse--that is what America is most about I think. I don't think I'm smarter or better than you are, but I do think I'm carrying less baggage in many of the important moments of my life, and, you know, I feel like that can't be bad! Maybe you are so used to your life that you would only be comfortable wrapped in some flag, religion, or culture. That's America, you have the right. Don't abuse it. And don't ask for privileges.

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