4th of July

Fourth of July is big here at this summer camp at which I work. A day of patriotic festivities ends with a fire works show in the camp director's backyard. Impressive and expensive: the ultimate American display. As the show blasted and glimmered along, a soundtrack played in the background of old-fashioned marches and yankee-doodle type songs. I felt while I was laying there on the blanket, gazing above the glow sticks and glowstick bracelets, like I was in turn of the century America ... circa 1903. I remembered just then the historical breadth of the country, a different direction to consider than iconic displays of the Fourth of July that are on holiday table place sets.

Last week and the week before I went to D.C. -- saw the monuments. My favorite was the Thomas Jefferson dome. It was peaceful there on the other side of the water. I wandered at one of the quote panels inside though. I looked it up again. It says:

"I am not an advocate for frequent changes in laws and constitutions, but laws and institutions must go hand in hand with the progress of the human mind. As that becomes more developed, more enlightened, as new discoveries are made, new truths discovered and manners and opinions change, with the change of circumstances, institutions must advance also to keep pace with the times. We might as well require a man to wear still the coat which fitted him when a boy as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their barbarous ancestors."

And I wonder if its true that societies evolve, if we really become more "enlightened" as time passes. My history teacher once said that each new technological advance promises leisure and enlightenment for the masses. Instead, well that doesnt happen. Is it just an inflation of problems and solutions, more solutions breeding more problems?

I was thinking about that while I was watching to fireworks. The colors traced over and over until I could see them even when my eyes were closed.