interview with eric

America is seen as the land of opportunity, where hard work can lead to achieving goals. It is a diverse country that values freedom and choice. American identity is defined by coming together as a group to protect these freedoms. Feeling most American happens during community celebrations, while feeling least American occurs during debates on religious beliefs like abortion. One important story is the unity and support shown during World War II. Being American allowed the speaker to have many opportunities and create a life for themselves and their family. The intersectionality of being American and having a spiritual identity is significant, as it allows for experiencing the beauty of the world. America has had its flaws, such as slavery and mistreatment of Native Americans, but progress is being made towards inclusivity and respect for all. Okay, so the first question is what does America mean to you? Opportunity. Just that? You don't want to give some more? I didn't know how much you want me to. What does it mean to me? It means that it is the land of opportunity. People can, if they work hard, they can achieve their goals. It is a land that allows the pursuit of your religious belief. It allows you to pursue any belief that you want and is inclusive in that. It is a land made up of many different individuals. That is what makes it great because we do have integration and we have people coming from all over the world come together. So the spirit and what it is meant to be is something very special. Okay, the next question is how would you define American identity? What do you mean by identity? My identity? No, in general. How would you define American identity? What does it mean to be American? What does it mean to be American? For me, what it means to be American is very similar to what I just answered, to be honest, in the sense that you are part of a very diverse group of people that has similar values in that they respect freedom and the freedom of choice in many different things, whether it is to bear arms, whether it is to pursue your religion, whether it is to work in one state or another. You have a lot of freedom of choice and we come together as a group of people to protect that freedom. I think our identity is that we are individuals that come together and respect everyone's freedoms. Of course, that is not where we started, but that is where our founding fathers of America have led us to and got us out of slavery, got us out of being able to have women vote and equal rights for all. Okay, when do you feel most American and when do you feel least American? When do I feel most American? I feel most American on the 4th of July when I am driving through the parade and watching everybody in the community wave and be happy. You have debates in the town council office and you have debates at work and different perspectives, but on the 4th of July everybody comes together and celebrates the fact that we are all here and we are there. When I feel least American is when the debate around the religious belief of abortion. Although we are supposed to have a separation of church and state in our constitution and allow those freedoms of choice, and yet we like to bring it into the political realm. So I don't feel very American whenever I continuously hear the debate about that. Do you remember what word I told you that means the separation of state and church? No. Secularism. Yeah, secularism. Thank you. Yes, I did remember that, but I didn't know that. I remember when you shared that with me, yes. Okay. What are some of your favorite or most important stories or lessons you would like to share about U.S. and world history? Some of the most important lessons? Stories. End stories. I think one of the most proud moments as I look back in history, and we've done a lot of bad things as a people, but one of the good things that we did was as we joined World War II, we went and helped the rest of the world in order to stop Hitler and the Japanese. And in doing so, our country really came together and pulled together where everybody that wasn't at the war was still fighting the war over here. They were in factories. They were making sure that we had enough supplies. And all the women were helping and building planes and everything else that was needed. And to see everybody come together to do that is for the right reasons and because we could. And eventually we got attacked, but the other reasons, we were gearing up to help the world. So I like the fact that we have the ability to help others that can't help themselves. So that's kind of a story that I like. And then do you have any personal stories that to you encapsulate what being American is? Yeah. I think for me, as I look at my life and my career, being American allowed me to have so much opportunity. I mean just so much. As I graduated college and made a decision that I just wanted to live in the mountains, I was able to go to the mountains and create a life. And that is because of what America is. And then I was even able to go explore the rest of the world from there. And it is something to me personally that allowed me to, whether I was in Colorado, whether I was in Utah, whether I was in California, I have the ability to choose to go to different places and really create a life for myself and my family. And then the last question is how has the intersectionality of your American identity and your other identities formed who you are today? My other identities, other than being an American, and how does that form? I think that I'm going to go back to the religious comment and the secularism that you pointed out. In the sense that my identity is not based on religion, but it's very spiritual. And it's very spiritual because I live in these amazing sense of places where I find such beauty in the mountains and love. And I relate that to being God and what God produces. Instead of reading a Bible and trying to figure out how I'm supposed to honor God, I'm out in the mountains because I was able to choose that with my American idea to honor God in that way. And pass that on to my kids and making sure that they understand the beauties of our world. And we are so lucky in this country to be able to do that. Whereas others, you know, if you go to Israel and Hamas and the Palestinians and everything that's going on there, they don't have those choices and nor would they ever have the opportunities that I did. Is there anything you want to add or say that you missed? I guess what I want to say in summary is that America is the theory of what our founding fathers have written in the Constitution. It's just an amazing document and it doesn't always play out the way it should. But nobody's perfect and we have to learn from our mistakes and we have to go there. But we've also had just some horrific actions where, you know, slavery and the Native Americans and how we interacted with them. It saddens me to look back at those times of history. But then I get excited as we turn the page and move forward and are becoming so inclusive and so respectful of everybody's perspective. And we need to continue to learn but not forget the past so that we can move forward. Amazing. Thank you.