A Letter to America

Dear America,

I love your "service with a smile". I love your twang... most of the time. I love your artists, your bluster, your swagger, your grand buildings with the names of philanthropists on the front. Your optimism, even when your economy sucks.

I love your absurd portion sizes, your ridiculous menu creations (donut french toast? whipped cream on everything?), your retro diners, your retro grocery packaging, the way you say "uh-huh" instead of "you're welcome". I love your opinionated self. I love your free refills, and the fact that you still have dollar bills, so that holding three of them feels like money and not change.

I (have grown to) love (even though it drives me CRAZY) the perverse dedicated way that ALL the gardeners in LA absolutely refuse to dead-head their roses, leaving overblown, blousy roses outside all the buildings, like aging starlets in faded summer dresses (scheming to hide the new blooms).

I love Broadway, and paying the U.S. price on things, even though there's the exchange rate to factor in. I love that I can justify this blog entry by pretending that it's an assignment for "The List as Post-Narrative Structure". I love that your sale prices are actually a bargain and not just marked-down mark-ups.

I know we don't agree on everything, and that I could make a list just as long with negative things, but I won't, 'cause that's not what love is about.