Happy Fourth of July

Happy Independence Day!!!

The Fourth of July here in Boston has been quite something else. We started this morning at the flag raising ceremony which included the national anthem, the pledge of allegiance, a message from the mayor of Boston, a performance by a band, and also by a drum and fife group. There were a bunch of Navy and Coast Guard there and also the Captain of the Swiss guards stationed at the Vatican. At the end of the ceremony we paraded down to the old cemetery where there was a short program at the gravesites of certain patriots including Samuel Adams and Paul Revere. I was really touched towards the end when a bugle was playing taps; it sounded beautiful in that crowded yet quiet and peaceful city street and I looked over and say an older gentleman probably in his 60s who was brought to tears. A funny thing that happened right after that was I was listening to a couple people speaking and I could almost understand what they were saying, so much so that I was certain they were speaking some Italian dialect. So I asked them what part of Italy they were from (in Italian of course) and the guy informed me I was wrong and he was actually from Spain but they were speaking Catalan. It was incredible how well I could understand them, we had about a five minute conversation me speaking Italian and he and his wife speaking Catalan and the only holdup I had was when they asked about fireworks. I was pretty proud of myself.

We then headed to the old city hall building to here the reading of the Declaration of Independence but unfortunately there were a lot of people so we couldn’t really understand what was being said, there were way too many echoes.

The next item on our agenda was to find a place to see the 21 gun salute to the nation from the USS Constitution. That proved more problematic than we thought it would be…. I just realized that so far too much of these blog entries have been simple story telling. I will try to be more creative in how I say what I’ve done from now on, I hope I haven’t been too boring.

I will continue by saying this, the next time I come to Boston for the Fourth of July I will know exactly what I want to do and how I want to it. I will be able to accomplish so much more in so much less time and it will be so much less stressful. Our plan was to catch the ferry over to the naval shipyard and watch from there; everything was going to plan and we had plenty of time until we realized that at 11 the Coast Guard closed down the harbor in preparation for the sailing of the USS Constitution. We missed the last boat across by 6 minutes. We started walking over and were trying to figure out the fastest way over, we couldn’t find a bus and we weren’t sure if there were any trains going over so we took about 45 minutes to finally get to a place where we could see. We found out that there was a train that we could have grabbed and we would have saved about 30 minutes. Ah, it’s so annoying. But the adventure was worth seeing the cannons being fired.

After a long nap back at home base, we headed out to find a spot for the fireworks show on the Charles River. We got an awesome spot right on the center of a bridge.

I love this country, and not just because we have the largest economy in the world, or because we dominate in the Summer Olympics (which I’m really excited for, go USA), or because we give more than any other nation in the world to charitable organizations, or because our military is the best armed forces in the world and is completely made up of men and women who join on a volunteer basis, or because we have some of the brightest minds in technology and science, or because we are ruled by elected officials who operate in a system designed to not let any one group of people become too powerful, or because any one who has the desire can become successful in life. No, all of those are great things about the United States of America but the reason I love this country is because it was established by the power of God and it is by His Hand that we may continue to succeed, as Benjamin Franklin said in reference to America, “if a sparrow cannot fall to the Ground without his Notice, is it probable that an Empire can rise without his Aid?” The Founding Fathers recognized our Savior’s Hand in the roots of this nation, we would do well to remember that as well. God bless America. However, this doesn’t come with its hazards. I was reading a book by Hugh Nibley, “Since Cumorah”, and in it he mentions the song “God Bless America” and the thing I got from it was that we cannot arbitrarily think that God is always in favor of what America does. It is very dangerous to be so arrogant to think a certain nation, or state, or group of people, or person can do no wrong (one exception does exist of course). What we need to remember is the promise this land has been given, which is “if ye keep my commandments ye shall prosper in the land—but if ye keep not his commandments ye shall be cut off from his presence” (Book of Mormon, Alma 37:13). It has been said that the most important thing we can do for our country is to keep the commandments because by doing so we make this nation more eligible for the blessings from the Lord and that is the only thing that can really help us.

The fireworks were amazing; I enjoyed singing along with the Boston Pops to the tunes of Take Me Out to the Ball Game, as well as a number of patriotic songs including “This Land Is Your Land” and “God Bless America”. Also Rascal Flatts was there performing and they are always great. The actual fireworks lasted for about 30 minutes but it sure went by awful fast, some of the fastest 30 minutes of my life.

I hope you enjoy some of these film clips I took from different things today.

Hm, I've been having issues with loading these video clips. Once I get it figured out I'll post them. Check back, they're worth the wait. At least I think so.