Aspirational Democracy

A few thoughts about loving the land

Photo by Moses Londo on Unsplash

This weekend we celebrated the origins of this country. And so today I’m delving into the idea patriotism. In these divisive times the word patriotism can feel a bit fraught, subject to very different interpretations or understandings of the word. But there is value in exploring and clarifying for ourselves what it means to love the land we stand upon, love what is valuable, powerful and good about being in a dynamic and diverse gathered community, and ponder what it looks like in these challenging times to live into the most aspirational qualities of democracy.

What do I choose each day to pledge my heart and allegiance? What am I called to do in service to what I have given my heart?

I read somewhere that forensic scientists can discern the place where you grew up or lived for a long time by the elements present in your bones. More recently they can tell where you have been living by the elements present in what is always growing, like our hair and nails. There is a poetry in the fact that we carry our landscapes within our memories and heart, but also quite literally in our body and bones and what continues to grow in us. The land becomes part of us as we become a part of the land. We grew from the elements taken into our mother’s body while in utero and we return those elements at the end of our lives— ashes to ashes and dust to dust.

Growing up in North Western Indiana, I spent a lot of time on Lake Michigan. Lake Michigan is the fourth largest body of fresh water on the entire planet. It looks and feels and acts like an ocean, just without the sharks. Even though such a large body of fresh water is rare in the whole world, it was my reference point for “big water.” I remember the first time I stood holding my mother’s hand side-by-side the Atlantic Ocean saying to her with great concern, “but something is wrong.” It smelled like salt, even the air itself had a salty tang to it. For the billions of people who live near an ocean, there could not be anything more right than the smell of salt water. But in my story, large bodies of water were always fresh, the air was always salt free. I still love Lake Michigan, its elements are in my body and bones, it feels like home.

I’ve also traveled internationally, and although I love so many places on this beautiful planet, and many of them I could happily live, there will always be something that my bones recognize in the north western corner of Indiana, that deeply love the deciduous forests and rolling hills of Monroe County and the smell of fresh water from a lake too wide to see across. No my grandfather immigrated to this country from Italy. He became a naturalized citizen, a State Senator, his body and bones took on the elements of this land, his heart came to love what was true and aspirational in the ongoing process of democracy.

And so there is the idea of “the land”. This is the land I love, that is entrusted with all of our care and protection. The land is in my body and bones. I belong to the land. And so, those of us in this deep relationship with land, are always called by love to keep it from environmental disaster. To honor it as we are part of it.

But a country is more than the land alone, it is also all its people and inhabitants. It is the networks of living things, the birds, insects, all creatures great and small, it is our communities and our richly diverse culture.

History relates that American democracy was aspirational when created. The right of every individual to the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness was still only a far away dream for persons of color, women and unlanded citizens. And yet, the framers did include a dynamic framework and a real possibility of an ongoing movement toward alignment with those most aspirational values. It envisioned the perfection of justice and equality for all. And so we who love the aspirational nature of democracy are called to try to bring it into a more fully realized expression. Individual rights honored and balanced with a deep commitment to the Common Good. A demand for truth, justice and equality for everyone - with no exceptions or carve outs. Not just tolerating diversity but to celebrate what makes our lands and our communities dynamic, growing, resilient and creative. Because of these core values, I understand the words patriot and patriotism to be a calling toward the better world, the kinder world, the more just world with respect for what quakers call “that of god” in every human spirit.

Some of the hallmarks of a healthy democracy are free and fair elections, checks and balances, a government that represents all the people, the rule of law, an independent judiciary, freedom of speech and expression, freedom of the press, respect for minority rights, accountability (no one is above the law). In the past years we have seen direct attacks on all of these healthy hallmarks. Our most cherished core values and these healthy hallmarks are the yardsticks that help us measure how we’re doing, and get a bead on what needs to happen to find our way forward on this aspirational journey.

And so as I ponder the words patriot and patriotism, it feels very personal and very collective. Personal in the way that my daily actions in this system matter. I am connected to this land by the very elements I carry around in my body. I pledge allegiance to fish and sparrow, to the doe and lightning bugs, to clean water and air, to an honorable and loving relationship with the land, to finding common ground and common good, demanding to see our shared aspirational goals of justice, truth and equality become reality for all.

I pledge allegiance to speaking the truth, when the truth isn’t easy. I pledge allegiance to listening, when in listening we learn. I honor Lincoln’s mystic chords of memory, a shared history of aspirational democracy. I pledge allegiance to the arc of justice, the importance of serving the common good. And I will continue to be a part of the ongoing creative revolution for the better world, the more just world, and for well being of all.

These days so much of what I love is under attack, so much feels very contrary to the values I hold dear. There are many in our current leadership that are letting go of an aspirational democracy in favor of an autocratic system of governance. And so I bring it back home, bring it back to human size, bring it back to what I love, bring it back what I believe is still possible, bring it back to what one person can do today.

And so each day I ask, “What is mine to do?” and “Who will go with me?”

And today I ask, “What do I love enough to keep working toward, what cherished values do I pledge my heart?” And “How do I best live into what I love each day”

---

Question

What does aspirational Democracy mean to you?

OR - After you listen to the song below “I Believe” and reading the poem “Making Sense” what are some of the small things and large things you believe in, that you pledge your allegiance too, that help ground you, that are the flashlights and yardstick that help you assess where we are at, and how to move forward.

---

Currently Booking 2026/27 Seasons

If you are interested in bringing me to your community visit The Chaffee Management Group website and Jim Chaffee can answer all your questions —ok, maybe not every questions about the definitive meaning of life, but I think he’d give it the old college try! Now onto the post…

---

Music Always Music

This is a song about the importance of sometimes naming the things we love, that we believe in and cherish. It’s called “I Believe” and was recorded on my collaboration with Amjad Ali Khan, Aman Ali Khan, and Ayan Ali Khan Everything is Everywhere. The album was created as a benefit for an interfaith hunger relief organization and of all my albums, it is one of my favorites to envision and create.

To listen to the full album here’s the Link

---

A Poem for Today

From my book of poetry Until Now: New Poems

Making Sense 
by Carrie Newcomer

Finding what makes sense
In senseless times
Takes grounding
Sometimes quite literally
In the two inches of humus
Faithfully recreating itself
Every hundred years.
It takes steadying oneself
Upon shale and clay and solid rock
Swearing allegiance to an ageless aquifer
Betting on all the still hidden springs.

You can believe in a tree,
With its broad-leafed perspective,
Dedicated to breathing in, and then out,
Reaching down, and then up,
Drinking in a goodness above and below
It’s splayed and mossy feet.
You can trust a tree’s careful
and drawn out way
of speaking.
One thoughtful sentence, covering the span of many seasons.

A tree doesn’t hurry, it doesn’t lie, 
It knows how to stand true to itself 
Unselfconscious of its beauty and scars, 
And all the physical signs of where 
and when It needed to bend,
Rather than break.
A tree stands solitary and yet in deepest communion,
For in the gathering of the many, 
There is comfort and courage, 
Perseverance and protection, 
From the storms that howl down from predictable 
Or unexplainable directions.    

In a senseless time
Hold close to what never stopped
Making sense.
Like love
Like trees
Like how a seed becomes a branch
And compost becomes seedlings again.
Like the scent at the very top of an infant’s head
Because there is nothing more right than that. Nothing.

It is all still happening
Even now.
Even now.

Making Sense