Letter From America: Thanksgiving

November 27
Portland, Oregon

I have been trying to find America's heartbeat. In the past it was easy because it was strong and steady. This week I tried to find a pulse.

The patient has seen better days. I grew up in an America where you worked hard and in time you were rewarded with the fruit of your labors. You joined the labor force, purchased a small home, worked some more and when you could afford to do so, built or bought something larger. You could expect to end your days secure and in comfort.

I haven't lived here for 27 years. In the meantime America has contracted a disease. The Subprime Financial Crisis is only the latest rash, but it's not the sickness. A lot of Americans got impatient. They wanted to taste the good life now and pay for it later, if ever. They didn't have to work hard. They could borrow the the things they wanted and the banks were dumb enough to let them do it.

Later is now. Of course, not everybody got sick, but this last year the ones that had been gorging themselves started heaving and puked. So these days Americans are trying to clean up the mess. They tell me about unemployment and reduced hours. Some of them, a lot of them are my age. There's not a lot of time left to work hard again.

But coming from a part of the world where health is the exception and not the rule, I see a country that is battling a cold but is still very strong. America enjoys the blessings of generations that did it the old fashioned way. Americans have a lot and they're grateful for it.

I haven't been in America for Thanksgiving for 27 years. I've been here a few times for Christmas and there's always been talk about how America has become commercialized and how holidays have lost their meaning.

America is sick and I don't think I have met one American this visit home that doesn't feel it on his/her own skin. So it is all the more inspiring how inspite of, or perhaps because of what ails America, Americans are truely thankful for the good land God has given them.

I took America's pulse this week.

Americans have a good heart. That's why I give America a clean bill of health.