Every year on July 4, to much fanfare and revelry, the United States marks its 1776 independence from Britain.
The date is also an official holiday in Puerto Rico and other de facto US colonies. So much for “independence”.
I was born in the US in 1982, and, before definitively freeing myself from the “land of the free” in 2003, got to experience many a Fourth of July celebration. One year, when I was 12 or 13 and living in the Texas capital of Austin, my family and I attended a massive Independence Day gathering by the river, complete with deafening music and fireworks that permanently traumatised our dog Bounder.
Although this was more than 25 years ago, I can still recall being disproportionately moved by the Lee Greenwood song, God Bless the USA – a staple of July 4th festivities – even as Bounder convulsed beside me. READ MORE AT AL JAZEERA ENGLISH.