But not just me.
Nope.
You’ve been had too.
We’ve all been had.
See, many years ago, decades even, the country needed something.
We needed something to believe in.
And we found something.
Something big, something that gave us a strong belief, a feeling of strength and togetherness.
And it made sense.
It all made sense.
And I lived that lie for all of my 60 years.
But now I’m finding I was had.
And now I wonder … what else was I told that is not true?
I don’t know what to believe anymore.
Next you’ll tell me I don’t have to wait 30 minutes to swim after eating something or I’ll get cramps and drown.
Or you’ll tell me if someone slaps me on the back while I’m making a funny face my face WON’T freeze like that.
Or even worse ……. You’ll tell me that if a step on a crack on the sidewalk it won’t break my mother’s back.
I feel cheated. Straight-up bamboozled. For years, I carried around this comforting little nugget of Americana: Betsy Ross, sitting by candlelight, stitching together the very first American flag. It was neat. It was tidy. It made sense. A nice lady with a needle and thread, giving birth to a symbol of freedom.
It touched home and it made sense.
Except—plot twist—that whole thing is basically a fairy tale. No eyewitnesses. No documentation. Just a story Betsy’s grandson decided to tell almost a century after the fact. That’s right, the flag-sewing origin story is less history and more “once upon a time.”
So now what? Now I’m supposed to believe it just…materialized? Some committee doodled stars and stripes, and anonymous hands ran it through a sewing circle? Where’s the magic in that? Where’s the wholesome “elementary school play” simplicity?
It’s like finding out Santa didn’t bring your presents, or that your favorite cookie recipe was invented by a marketing team at Nabisco. I wanted Betsy Ross. I wanted the needle, the hoop, the proud little smile as she set down her thimble. Instead, I get a shrug and “historians say nope.”
I feel robbed—not of patriotism, but of the good story I thought went with it. Because sometimes the myth is the magic. And now? It feels like someone stole my magic and left me with minutes from a committee meeting.
It’s answers I want.
I want the truth.
But Now I’m to hear, “YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH !!!”
My Take on Life and Events 