Ahmerikuh

Aww, you guys! I missed you.

They say that studying abroad is a life changing experience – you’ll learn a metric crap-ton about another culture, and in the process maybe learn a thing or two about yourself – admittedly, you could get roughly the same effect by watching an episode of The Amazing Race followed by a rerun of Party of Five, but you wouldn’t have any stories to tell at parties and the pictures would be way less interesting.

In England I learned all kinds of stuff about the culture and lifestyle of people in the United Kingdom. I dove in head goddamn first – I lived with a family, I rode public transportation, and against my better judgment I watched a couple of World Cup games.

Now, though, I’m back in the United States, jet lagged to high heaven, looking forward to some free time to focus on video games and fretting about the internship situation. “What did you learn?” you ask.

I’ll tell you what I learned:

America fucking rules.

Please, before you bring up all the reasons why it maybe doesn’t rule so much, allow me to explain.

Something that’s always impressed me is how parents of children who are mentally challenged are able to keep going day after day, raising a child who will never really grow up and will always require care, either from the parents or from the state. It looks to me like a hopeless situation – Sisyphus and his boulder, so to speak, only every day he has to look around and see thousands of other people proudly rolling their boulders up the hill and then going on to live out their twilight years in ease and comfort. Somehow, though, they do it. It’s a feat that requires a strength I can’t imagine, and is yet another reason why I never want to have children.

Nick Hornby is an English author who wrote “About A Boy” and “High Fidelity,” among others, who happens to be the father of an autistic son. Some time ago he wrote a magazine article about the daily trials and rewards of raising a mentally challenged child – breakfast, putting on a jacket, or getting into the car can all spontaneously become a huge ordeal depending on what his son’s condition is that day. Circumventing these potential blowups and finding solutions for these problems, day by day, is just part of his relationship with his son, and it’s part of what he loves about him.

I don’t want to belittle Nick Hornby’s situation nor that of any parent in these circumstances (any more than I already have by mentioning them on this little fart joke parade I call a blog), but I have to say I feel like that’s the best way to describe why I love the United States so much.

We lead all other first world countries in teen pregnancy rates, gun crimes, serial killers, and obesity. We consume asinine amounts of natural resources and waste enough food to feed entire African countries. Private interests are giving our elected officials 24/7 blumkins. Our environmental record isn’t so hot right now. A significant contingent of our country is convinced that global warming is a myth and that our president is a Muslim, and further convinced that being a Muslim makes you an unfit leader.

But hey – we just got healthcare!

Sure, it’s weak and the special interests shot it to hell, and sure, it basically broke our government getting it passed, and sure, trying to provide medical care for everyone in the country has a lot of people praying for our president to be assassinated, but that’s cool. We got healthcare, just like all the other countries. That’s one ordeal we managed. Today, our kid got a little bit more like all the other kids who’ve had healthcare for decades.

One day at a time, folks.

These were the things that disgusted me before I went to England – these were the reasons why, in high school, I swore up and down that I’d move to Canada as soon as I was out of college. But the fact is, the whole time I was in countries like England and Denmark, countries that have healthcare, the environment, and foreign policy pretty much on lockdown, I just got bored when they’d talk about their problems.

“What, members of parliament are abusing their room and board allowances? Jesus, people, don’t sweat the small stuff – I think it’s illegal for members of Congress not to abuse their stipends.”

England is a beautiful country and they’ve got their head in the right place when it comes to conservation and public policy, but I could never live there. Part of it is just because I love my own country’s culture so much, but it’s also because it’s just not as exciting. In America we’re struggling on a daily basis to stay true to the Constitution and be The Good Guy in the international arena, which is seldom pleasant and never easy. That right there is what we call dramatic conflict – real Battlestar Galactica quality stuff, although it unfortunately lacks space battles and sexy robots (so far). Countries like England already have so many of the contentious issues figured out that whatever they’ve got left to fight about looks to me to be about as interesting as a show about rich people trying to decide what shoes to wear.*

*Which is why I don’t watch Sex and the City.

I love America’s faults, and I love America’s triumphs. I love that our culture is so strong that there are entire TV channels in England dedicated to showing American programming. I love that, even though we’re big and brash and kind of rude, our heart is usually in the right place.

Truman Capps is going to trot this blog entry out if ever he runs for public office.

Bonus, late update special:

Soccer

You know what else I love about America? The fact that we play real fucking sports. I suppose I’m in no real position to comment, seeing as the only sport I like is football, but I watched some World Cup games over there, and I did not like what I saw.

Seriously, everybody? That’s the sporting event that drew 715 million viewers in 2006? Does the rest of the world just not know about football or something?

A lot of my friends on Facebook are pretty excited about the World Cup and have been very avidly following it, which came as something of a shock to me. These are legitimately intelligent American people for whom I have a lot of respect, many of whom are Oregon Marching Band members, so for me to see them getting all excited about soccer when I’ve personally joined them in experiencing the majesty of college football is like watching a bunch of grown men sitting around eating paint chips.

They say that soccer is a better “show of athleticism” because there’s no time outs, and that may well be true, but what I do know is that in a football game, you’re going to be seeing people out there making some plays and scoring some fucking points, not chasing a ball around and consistently missing a very large goal. If I had to choose between no time outs and people scoring, I’d pick people scoring – I’m willing to put up with a few time outs if it means I don’t have to blow 90 straight minutes watching a bunch of people running around in the middle of a field, kicking a ball back and forth until the game ends in a scoreless tie, as it so often does. I mean, shit, if that was all I had to get excited about I’d have a riot afterwards too. Fortunately, I have football.

No, not “American football” – I used to get specific like that, back before I’d sat down and watched a couple of soccer games, but not anymore. Football is football: Forward pass, blitz, field goal, Statue of Liberty, Hail Mary, John Madden football. I realize that soccer may have had the name first, but that doesn’t matter. They lost their right to the name about the time they decided that it was okay to play a game that cranks out scoreless tie after scoreless tie. Get used to it. You watch soccer. It’s Latin for Shitball.

When I want to see something entertaining, exciting, and legitimately badass, I watch football. When I want to see a good “show of athleticism”, I’ll go watch a fucking Pilates class.

THESE COLORS DON’T RUN