This Is America to Me

I love my country — not because it’s perfect, but because it gives me mornings like this.

We love the walk from our neighborhood through Tosa East Towne — that stretch where every block surprises you with something different. Stately old homes, wildflower gardens trying to escape their fences, front yards that look like they’ve been tended for generations. We’re grateful to have found our own unique little brick bungalow — so Milwaukee, so us.

This morning, we strolled through the historic Washington Highlands — where no two houses look the same, each one holding its own story in brick and wood and wide front steps. Massive shade trees leaning in close, sidewalks cracked just enough to remind you how long they’ve been holding neighbors up — and how easily they could crumble if nobody cares enough to keep them. Same with the freedom I’m talking about here.

Harvey and Lewis trot just ahead — the steady click of their nails on the pavement almost rhythmic, a soft percussion under the hum of birds and the distant pop of someone testing fireworks before the sun’s even high. They tug at the leashes for every squirrel, every bunny slipping under a hedge, every bark that might mean a new friend.

We round the corner onto 60th and the energy shifts. The faint whiff of coffee drifts toward us like an invisible invitation. There’s definitely some kind of Pavlovian effect — tails wag a little slower now, my own steps fall into an easier pace. That first smell always feels like time slowing down just enough.

A few blocks more brings us to Valentine on 60th and Vliet. The air is warm and heavy now, summer pressing down in a way that makes you grateful for the shade of a storefront awning. The boys sprawl out on the sidewalk, tongues out, eyes wide, taking in the world from the ground up while we sip our coffee and they get a cup of cool relief. So happy now, so content to just watch the world pass by.

Freedom, for me, looks like this:

Two dogs stretched out on warm concrete, the scent of fresh brew in my hand, my partner beside me, and the quiet gift of a morning with nowhere to be.

It’s small — but if we’re lucky, these small things are what we get to keep. If we’re willing to protect them.

I tend to think more locally these days — our block, our little piece of Milwaukee. But pull back — twenty thousand feet up — and how many “Tosa East Townes” are out there? How many people, just like me, are doing the same thing this morning? Coffee in hand, dogs at their feet, waving to a neighbor, watching the world wake up.

That’s America. Or maybe that’s what we mean when we say Americana. Not the big gestures — but the everyday ones we’re lucky to share.

And it’s easy to forget that what ties us together doesn’t shout — it hums. It hums under porch lights at dusk, under cracked sidewalks that have held up generations of feet, under a flag that waves over ordinary homes like ours.

It hums in the freedom to walk your block without fear, to pause for coffee, to breathe in a morning you don’t have to earn because someone already did.

But the hum goes quiet — and the cracks get wider — if we stop paying attention.

We argue, we draw lines, we guard our corners like kingdoms. But here — on this worn stretch of street, under this same sky — we’re just neighbors. And if we want to keep calling this freedom, we’d better remember: neighbors don’t just share the block — they stand guard for it. They patch the cracks when they come. They keep the hum alive so our kids can hear it, too.

So today, I’m grateful for all of it. For our brick bungalow and these Milwaukee streets. For the Highlands and its grand porches. For the sound of dog nails on concrete. For good coffee, better company — and the promise that the country I love is still worth protecting, piece by piece, block by block.

Happy Fourth of July.

May your piece of freedom feel like this — familiar sidewalks, wagging tails, and the steady reminder that we’re still worth the work.

What does freedom look like to you today — and what will you do to keep the hum alive?