Wearing our hearts on our lapels
: William Quick sends us to a San Fran Chron column by John Carman that wonders how long Letterman and Leno will keep wearing their flag pins.
The pins have to come off sometime, if only because in another year or two, they will reclaim their original meaning: I am a conservative Republican, and more American than you.
Quick makes fun of this, for some good reason. But I have to admit I’ve been wondering the same thing. I’m still wearing my pin (I gave up the ribbon motif for a plain flag, but a straight one in an artsy silver frame, none of this waving). My attitude is still: I was almost killed by these sons-of-bitches just because I’m American and so I’m wearing the flag in some small defiance.
But I do wonder how long this will last. I’m just about the only person wearing a flag. I don’t know when and whether it will become a bit embarrassing.
Meanwhile, the paper flags I see on car and house and office windows are fading from red-white-and-blue to pink-tan-and-aqua and the flags flying from cars are getting more threadbare by the week. The flags are all fading, from windows and cars and lapels.
I hope it won’t take another attack to bring them back.
