The Fourth Of July

[Sean Judge <sjudge@umaxc.weeg.uiowa.edu>]

Yesterday, while with a friend of mine (who is fanatic about Kate Bush), I
bumped into some old high school friends after our town's fireworks display.
One of them had left Iowa for her childhood home of New Zealand in 1987, and
it had been that long since I'd seen her.  Anyway.  I, in my cynical way, was
saying something to the effect of "Gee, I love America.  I mean, where else
can you celebrate our nation's grandeur, and then go to a segregated club
somewhere for a drink?"  To my suprise not too many of them laughed at the
sarcasm.  Then I told them about a recent California law making segregated 
businesses unable to get tax breaks, and how I thought it was about TIME for
SOMETHING against those sickening places to happen.  Then one of my old "friends" spoke up about how 'many blacks want segregated places', and this inspired
the New Zealander to pipe up about how the natives of her country wanted more
rights such as making the country bi-lingual, and about how they wouldn't be
as "civilized" as they were if New Zealand hadn't been taken over by english
speaking people. "They would still be banging rocks together.  You can't get
a law degree with a rock."  Then they all laughed.  I was speechless with
disgust when (and I LOVE her for this!) my friend sang out: "Many an aborigine
mistaken for a tree til you near him on the motorway, the tree begins to breathe."  They all looked puzzled, so I said "Oh, that's a song by Kate Bush about
exactly the attitude you have...just set in Australia."  Then my friend and
I looked at each other with complete comprehension of each other's inner thoughts.