Incredible Easter Experience II

I said yesterday that my heart was saddened when I heard Anne gush on and on about how the people in my country understand that hard work and education are the key to success. You see, she also turned to my daughter and told her that she needed to work hard for what she wanted and never give up. That she lived in the greatest country in the world and could continue that but if the young people do not continue to work hard and build on what the old people built, then her generation would lose it all.

Anne pointed out to my daughter that she would need to earn the things she had. That she was so blessed and she needed to know that. That she was blessed to be born in America and because of that, she had a great responsiblity to the rest of the world.

I try really hard to keep politics out of this blog, but on this Easter Sunday afternoon, I felt like driving Anne to Washington DC and set her up with a microphone on the front lawn of the White House. I'm seeing people wanting things that they do not deserve simply because they want it. They believe they deserve it simply because they were blessed to born in the United States.

We are becoming a nation of gimmes instead a nation of hard-work and determination. We want things that we didn't work for and are too lazy to get off our butts and get it. In America, like Anne said, it's all here. You just have to be willing to sacrifice to get it. No one said it would be easy. Anne understands this, she doesn't own a car, she walks. She sacrificed living with her family to a country where she knows no one in a city where she didn't even know existed until a year and a half ago to go to a university so she can get a nursing degree.

Very few Americans are willing to sacrifice these days. We want everyone else to sacrifice for us. Give it to me, we say. Our constitution says we should get everything our hearts desire. Anne seems to understand the American dream better than most of us. No wonder our immigrants are doing better than so many of our citizens. They understand that although America offers great opportunity, no one ever said that reaching your goals would be easy. It would require hard work and sacrifice.

I really enjoyed having Anne for Easter and plan to invite her many times into our home. And she was right when she told my daughter that if our young generation does not work to achieve greatness, it will be taken away, especially the freedoms that our forefathers fought and died for. The freedoms to succeed and achieve our dreams and goals. It was bittersweet to hear someone who is not American understand the American dream better than most who sit in Congress and freely walk our streets.