By Kyndra Light, Special to Red Tape Florida
As our family pulled our RV onto the highway this week, I found myself thinking about the weight of this Independence Day.
Two hundred and fifty years.
It is difficult to comprehend that number.
Behind it are generations of ordinary Americans who built homes, tilled fields, started businesses, served in uniform, raised children, buried loved ones, worshiped together, argued with one another, and somehow kept moving forward.
This Fourth of July feels different.
Not because America is perfect. No nation ever has been.
But because for two and a half centuries, generation after generation, ordinary people have believed this country was worth building, improving, defending, and passing on.
Like many families, mine stretches deep into that story.
My roots reach into the hills of Virginia and North Carolina and even farther across the Atlantic to Scotland and Ireland. One branch of my family traces back to Richard Henry Lee who signed the Declaration that forever changed the course of history. Other branches tell quieter stories of military service, public service, farming, teaching, and raising families. My father retired as an Air Force lieutenant colonel. My brother serves as an Air Force pilot. Today, my oldest son serves as a submariner in the United States Navy.
Every time I look in the mirror, my red hair reminds me of those Scottish hills.
But what I inherited is far more important than genetics.
I inherited a spirit.
A spirit that whispers there is always another mountain to climb, another frontier to explore, another generation to prepare.
A spirit that urges us to learn, to build, to serve, to love, and to multiply the gifts God has entrusted to us.
Even writing those words, my heart swells.
My skin tingles.
It is difficult to explain, but I suspect many Americans know exactly what I mean.
For years I thought patriotism was mostly about remembering the past.
Lately, I have come to believe it is equally about stewarding the future.
History is rarely made by those who seek it.
More often, it is made by ordinary people who become so devoted to truth, duty, faith, or freedom that when history comes knocking, they answer. Until then, they are simply living ordinary lives with extraordinary faithfulness.
Think about the men who signed the Declaration of Independence.
They did not sign because they wanted statues.
Quite the opposite.
They signed knowing they were risking everything. Their livelihoods. Their homes. Their reputations. Their fortunes. Even the safety of their families.
They were not pursuing greatness.
They were answering conscience.
History remembered them because conviction demanded action, not because fame did.
That truth did not end in 1776.
It simply became our turn.
Most of us will never sign a declaration, command an army, or hold elected office.
Instead, history has entrusted us with something different.
A family.
A classroom.
A small business.
A church.
A neighborhood.
A community.
History is not written only in capitols or on battlefields.
It is written around kitchen tables.
In welding shops.
On baseball fields.
Inside classrooms.
Around conference tables.
In church pews.
In the quiet decisions no one else ever sees.
A republic is not preserved by extraordinary people doing extraordinary things once in a generation.
It is preserved by ordinary people doing ordinary things extraordinarily well, generation after generation.
That is why I believe work matters.
Work is service.
Service gives us purpose.
Purpose is one of the ways we honor both God and the gifts we have been entrusted to steward.
Whether we are raising children, teaching students, starting businesses, serving in uniform, caring for aging parents, coaching Little League, or quietly doing our jobs with excellence, every honest day’s work contributes something to the country we all share.
Someone recently said, “If you want to hate America, watch the news. If you want to love America, drive through it.”
I smiled because I knew exactly what they meant.
As I write these words, our RV is rolling down the interstate toward Orlando. My husband is driving. My youngest son is looking out the window. My oldest son is home from the Navy. Soon all four of our children will be together for the first time in months. I cannot think of a better way to celebrate America’s 250th birthday than surrounded by the people I love most in the country I have always been grateful to call home.
Drive through America for a few days and you’ll begin to understand her.
You’ll find the woman selling peaches from a roadside stand.
The campground neighbor who walks over just to welcome you.
The veteran quietly mowing his lawn.
The father coaching Little League after work.
The mechanic who stays late so a family can continue their vacation.
The waitress who remembers your name.
The stranger who says, “You’ve never been on the lake? Come with us.”
The family proudly flying a flag from the front porch.
These are the people who quietly sustain a nation.
Not because anyone is watching.
Not because history will remember their names.
But because they choose faithfulness again and again.
America has never been perfect.
Neither have I.
Neither has any family.
Neither has any generation.
The miracle is not that we have always gotten everything right.
The miracle is that every generation has been given another opportunity to leave something better than it found.
Mother Teresa once said, “If you want to change the world, go home and love your family.”
I believe she was right.
Perhaps preserving a republic begins the same way.
Love your family well.
Raise children who surpass you.
Teach them to love God.
Teach them to work.
Teach them to seek truth.
Teach them to serve others with humility.
Teach them that freedom is not merely inherited.
It is practiced.
Every single day.
Two hundred and fifty years after America’s founding, I am not a founder.
I am not a statesman.
I am simply an ordinary woman raising her family in Tallahassee.
Perhaps that is exactly where history has always been made.
Quietly.
Faithfully.
One generation at a time.
Perhaps that is the American spirit.
Not the promise that life will always be easy.
Not the claim that we have always gotten everything right.
But the enduring belief that, with God’s grace, each generation can leave the next with more freedom, more opportunity, more wisdom, and more hope than it inherited.
That is the inheritance I received.
It is the inheritance I pray my children will one day pass to theirs.
Kyndra Light is Senior Consultant at Tallahassee State College, where she works to strengthen workforce development and build partnerships that connect education, industry and community.