This morning when I came into work, a German employee greeted me with,
“Well, America’s really fallen apart now."
He is right. While I love my country and often try to stand up for my country, I can’t today. I am not proud to be an American right now.
It is a very sad thing, to not be excited about moving back to your country. But now, even though we miss family and friends terribly, we are looking at an opportunity to stay in Europe until 2011. And we really, how can we say no?
If we move back now, we won’t have time to recoup the money we were saving for a house. If we move back now, we’ll be subject to possibly another Republican White House. If we move back now, we’ll only be paid in dollars. The horror. At this point, airline miles might be better payment.
To depress me further, I watched the Couric/Palin interviews and compared them with the Saturday Night Live skit. It was hard to tell them apart. But the worst part was, to watch them online via the Huffington Post, I had to sit through a commercial.
This commercial was for the Discover Card. The voice-over said, “America is a country of consumerism. And that’s ok. Because there are so many great things to buy.” (Or something to that effect).
Wow. I mean really.
It’s time to take that commercial off the air, the internet or wherever else it runs. America’s in financial crisis and all we get preached to is to buy more on credit? America’s debt, country and individual is embarrassing and we don’t need commercials like this trying to make it worse. I have to say, I think credit card commercials should be as illegal as smoking commercials. They’re both killing us in different ways.
Sorry to be pessimistic right now, more happy things to come about our weekend in Paris. Perfect weather. Smoke free cafes. And Monet’s garden that was still overflowing with flowers even in late September. Yes, it’s easy to get caught up in the gloom, even from afar, but luckily there are still beautiful things in life. One of them being the ballot I have in my hand right now. It’s definitely time to vote from abroad.
4 comments:
That is so weird because I had a similar experience today at lunch where a coworker started the conversation by saying something like, "So America is pretty much... " and you can fill in that blank.
Um. Yeah. All I could do was nod and then avert my eyes as I knew the talk was going to turn into how we are pulling down the global economy. And it did... but I reassured them I was voting Obama and they seemed to find a glimmer of hope left in the world.
What ever are we going to do if McCain wins...
I know what you mean. I just hope the Americans come to their senses for once this century.
I couldn't agree more about the state of America, buying on credit, etc. Not even mentioning the fact that America isn't owned by America anymore. We talk about moving to Canada all the time. God help us if we have 4 more years of Republicans in office...
I agree. Well, Switzerland's always nice :)
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