We live, they say, in a divided country. Divided by party, divided by income, divided by region and, mostly tellingly, divided by race.
The great grandchildren of immigrants don't recognize their own stories in the tales told by the newest Americans. In fact, they don't even hear those stories as we seclude ourselves in neighborhoods and towns populated by those who look like us, think like us, are us.
With no common, shared experience, perhaps we don't see that the things we have in common are greater than the things that separate us.
I lived on a series of Air Force bases growing up. And on those bases, the only thing more consistent than having B-52 jet engines rev up just as you tried to watch an episode of "Gunsmoke" was the fact servicemen come from all over this country, and marry women from all over the world.
We were stationed in Michigan while I was in junior high school. Across the street from us lived a staff sergeant who had met and married his wife in Okinawa. They had three sons, all with first names that started with the letter "T." Their dog, a beagle, was named Tina. Privately, we thought that was a name too far.
I used to play baseball with the "T's" in a field across the street from our neighborhood. The oldest son was named Tommy and his favorite player was an outfielder for the San Francisco Giants named Jimmy Rosario. Rosario had the misfortune of sort of replacing Willie Mays, so it's realistic to believe my friend may have been the one and only member of his fan club.
Tommy came by his Rosario fandom when we were going through some baseball cards and he decided the outfielder looked Okinawan. Considering Rosario was born in Puerto Rico, it's highly unlikely. But, we were quite a few years away from actual Asian baseball-playing role models, so, Tommy did the best he could.
Down the block a couple of duplexes (they were all duplexes; "uniform" extends to so much in the military) was a senior master sergeant who married while attached to a mission in northern Europe and brought his Swedish wife to the USA. I had no idea what Ingrid Bergman looked like but I was pretty sure that was her.
Both her husband and her son had bright red hair and thick Alabama accents. Apparently, a thick Alabama accent is a genetic trait that overwhelms any possible Nordic influences. Or English.
Our next-door neighbors were from Boston, or, as they said it, "Baaaasten." We were all afraid of the father, who seemed to only want to chain smoke and fish, by himself. He survived a heart attack and came out of the hospital a totally different person. He never went anywhere without one of his children and started coaching Little League. He still went fishing, he just took the kids with him, patiently baiting hooks and acting like every bluegill was a swordfish.
Apparently, change is possible.
Down the block, a large Hispanic family from central California lived next to the African-American head of the base's Security Police and his wife and sons. We used to play football in their front yard while the neighborhood moms stood in the driveway and complained about the fact that their husbands were never home.
And when it snowed, we all went outside and shoveled off driveways, regardless of the lateness of the hour, because the rule was the dads had to be able to get cars out one hour after the last snowflake fell. The kids from Okinawa and the kids from Alabama and the kids from California and the kids from Sweden and all the kids from all over the world moved from one house to the next because, well, everyone's father had an important job. And the moms came out with hot chocolate.
It wasn't perfect. We fought. There were petty rivalries and unkind words and periodic mistrust. We were normal kids, except some of had grandparents who sent odd sweaters from Europe or whose moms recoiled at the possibility of cooking with Japanese soy sauce.
It's possible we build our own walls in this nation, walls we put up around ourselves. And maybe, if we'd climb them every now and then, we'd discover how much we have in common, how many mutual experiences we can share. Like fishing for bluegill or trying to understand Swedish by way of Montgomery. Or playing baseball with the Okinawan T's.
Commentary on 11/11/2016