I hold this truth to be self-evident: that anything meant to be frequently in contact with water (shower rack, for example) should not be made out of metal that rusts easily. Because SERIOUSLY. How dumb.
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One of the children in our household brought home information about The Constitution, and what surprised me is that reading it chokes me up as quick as hearing The Star-Spangled Banner: at some point in my own educational experience my brain hard-wired this stuff to Deep Emotion.
It occurred to me later while making dinner that “We hold these truths to be self-evident” is super-gorgeous writing. It’s all, “We don’t think this even needs to be said, BUT HERE IT IS IN CASE SOME OF YOU ARE A BIT SLOW AND NEED TIME TO CATCH UP.”
But then I thought how obnoxious I’d find that phrase if I didn’t agree with one or more of the truths. Which I would then refer to as “truths,” using a sarcastic tone of voice. But it’s hard to argue with “all men are created equal.” Isn’t it. Except for the part where “men” means “oh, women too, obviously.” Because the word “people” would mean typing FOUR MORE LETTERS GAH NO WAY DEAL-BREAKER AMIRITE??
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When I learned about The Declaration of Independence in school, I don’t remember it affecting me as sentimentally. It’s kind of like poetry: it takes some slow reading and some mulling to understand the convoluted phrasing—and then once you understand what it MEANS, the convoluted phrasing seems like the beautiful way to say it.
Here’s what it says: “When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
Here’s what it means: We’re leaving you. We think it’s only fair to tell you why, instead of just taking off without even saying goodbye.
Here’s what it says: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Here’s what it means: WE (unlike YOU cheeseheads, is the implication you should be picking up at this point) think it’s obvious that everybody’s a person, and that it’s only fair that all each person should get the same basic rights.
And so on. I like it better all fancy, but only after it makes sense.
But see, I think they actually *meant* “men”. None of them thought women were equal to men, right? We sort of came around to that, hundreds of years later.
Kate- They didn’t think black men were equal, either, right? So it needed some work, apparently. …Er, STILL needs some work, apparently.
Yeah, they totally just meant white men. Not women or anyone of color. It might seem like a minor quibble, but I really think it’s important to remember how sexist and racist some of our political doctrines are, because not specifically remembering and noting means forgetting, and forgetting leads to devaluing the political movements that have led to the greater equality we have now.
They didn’t type back then, though. They had all those fancy cursive letters that look like they took a long time to write.
I tend to get weepy now, too. Which I thought was just me, I’m glad it’s not.
Also, still re-living horrible memories from the first part of this post. One morning, very early, sun hadn’t fully risen, we awoke to a massive huge bang, clatter, breakage, boom, kapow. Scared the living crap out of both of us. Go into the bathroom and the dumb shower shelf thing rusted at the inside pole joint thing and collapsed in on itself- right through the shower curtain and spilled everything all over the bathroom, tub, everywhere. Exploded bottles and a shower radio in shards. I was NOT happy and remembered that “why would this rust?” feeling. I think it was maybe 3 years old. Way too early to be worrying about a SHOWER accessory to rust out and kill us all in the wee morning hours.
They also really only meant white men who owned property, since those were the only ones with voting rights…
Also, blogger, WTH is up with captchas that involve blurry photos of street addresses. Is this really necessary?
Would you mind doing this for the entire thing? Because I enjoyed your explanations immensely!
I get all chokey, too, when the national anthem is sung. I never used to. Age (and motherhood) has made me more maudlin, I guess!
I also like that the last bit you translated says “that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…” I interpret the “their” as “everyone has the same rights, given by their own god, whoever/whatever that may be.” Freedom of religion and all that.
CARRIE- Ha! Thanks! I was thinking I might—and then realized I was…er, less clear…on the rest.
Is it wrong that, although I wholeheartedly agree with Kate and Anonymous about the Constitution, and needing to remember that we’ve come a long way from where the country started (and that we still have a ways to go) when it comes to equality, the thing that spurred me to comment was the rusty shower apparatus? I was hoping someone would have a magical solution, since ours looks disgusting at this point.
Shallowness: 1, Intellectualism: 0
There are two (big, beautiful) books written/illustrated by Sam Fink, that take the Constitution and the Declaration of Indepedence phrase by phrase and put an illustration with each phrase to help the reader understand what it means. We’ve really enjoyed those books at my house =). Here’s the Constitution: http://www.amazon.com/Constitution-United-States-America/dp/1599620820/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1358615038&sr=1-1&keywords=the+constitution+Sam+Fink and the Declaration: http://www.amazon.com/Declaration-Independence-Sam-Fink/dp/0439703158/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1358615194&sr=1-1&keywords=Declaration+of+Independence+Sam+Fink I think I got mine on Ebay.
I love the beautiful language they used for those documents!
I discovered something recently that has been hard-wired for me: the coronation of Queen Elizabeth. We were at the Tower of London looking at the Crown Jewels and there was a video of her coronation and my throat got all tight and I cried! I had no idea that it would affect me so strongly. I mean, she IS the Queen of Canada, but that’s not really drilled into our heads so much at school. She’s on our money & stamps, her portraits hang in federal government offices but in day-to-day life, that’s it really. Why would get so choked up and sob at the sight of her getting crowned? Weird!
Alice- I too felt that the MAIN take-away from this was that SHOWER STUFF SHOULD NOT RUST. Second take-away: patriotic documents/songs can cause surprising teariness.
And the dishwasher basket! The coating on mine has begun to peel and rust and the plate dividers are now disintegrating. That should not happen! Do they even sell replacement baskets for dishwashers?
I have a solution for the rust problem! It’s annoying, in the why should I have to do more work for something that should already come rust-proof way, but it works: spray all the pieces with a coat or two of Rust-Oleum. Beats replacing the shower rack every year or so due to rust issues…
Kendra- OMG YES. Why would they take something that is meant to be continually bombarded with water, AND MAKE IT RUSTABLE??
Kate2- Hey! I will have to try this!
When I taught 4th grade, my students and I together memorized the first quarter of the Declaration of Independence (by reading it together each day until we all had it) (and of course, being old and forgetful, it was always a new learning experience for me every year!). I loved the words, too, and never got tired of hearing them.
I think my favorite line (especially with all of us reciting it together with gusto) was: “BUT … when a LONG TRAIN of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their RIGHT, it is their DUTY, to THROW OFF such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.” We always recited this loudly with considerable arm waving.
Learning it slowly and thoroughly was actually quite thought-provoking. For example, one stops to wonder if the abuses and usurpations WERE to the level of absolute despotism. The first year I memorized that section was the first time I gave it serious thought.
“Here’s what it means: We’re leaving you. We think it’s only fair to tell you why, instead of just taking off without even saying goodbye.”
I always know when you update there is going to be something in there that is going to crack me up.
I want you to translate the rest of it! And other historical documents. Swistle Notes!
My first thought was also, “Swistle should do the whole thing.”
In your spare time, of course.
I LOVE Susan’s comment above. :)
First of all, you really should translate the whole thing and sell it to schools (I think we had some Shakespeare books like that with the original words on one page and the more modern translation on the page opposite it). But mostly, what I was thinking is how much it sounds like a breakup letter, and I’d love to read a breakup letter disguised as something fancy ;)