I am a picnic outfitter by trade. Did you know?
For six years, I ran a brick-and-mortar shop called Vintage Picnic in a small fishing village near the Chesapeake bay. We stocked everything for the perfect picnic – save for food and drink. My husband restored charming old baskets, while I curated vintage china and glass, and sewed gorgeous wraps and pouches to put them in.
How frivolous, you’re thinking. And indeed, when Covid broke out in early 2020, the state of Maryland declared Vintage Picnic a non-essential business and closed our doors.
It was hard, but my tiny business truly was non-essential. Nothing could be more non-essential than a romantic picnic basket! And – in a roundabout way – picnics are why I am writing this blog on our nation’s birthday. Non-essential things like picnics – de rigueur July 4 celebratory fare – are the epitome of a society blessed with some measure of prosperity, leisure, and peace.
(I am pretty sure there aren’t a lot of picnics happening in Kiev right now.)
Think about it. A Fourth of July picnic – whether with potato salad and cold beer, or pesto and pinot gris –takes place in the pastoral highlands of a stable republic. Whether we realize it or not, the sacred rituals of gathering with friends, grilling steaks, and tossing a frisbee all rest on the strong back of democratic institutions, free and fair elections, grace for one’s opponents, a fierce commitment to liberty and justice for all.
So far so good. But what do democratic institutions rest on? A piece of parchment? And what supports that?What is the foundation of the human and political rights we argue so strenuously about today? Is it not inherent human dignity? Where does that come from? The Declaration of Independence – signed 247 years ago today and the basis for the whole American enterprise – states that our inalienable rights come from the “Creator.” They are an endowment and not politically manufactured.
The founders disagreed on a lot of things, slavery chief among many painful divisions, but out of a widespread religious sentiment they coalesced on this point: that human beings were made equal. They failed grievously to make good on that beautiful idea, as unabated enslavement and the trauma of the 1860s would bear out.
There is unfinished national business to attend to, and we must work to ensure that the long arc of justice works itself out. However, to jettison the sacred basis for the republic is to play with fire. What do you replace the Creator with? The creature? Personal preference? Power politics? Guns? I’ll take the wise and good Creator over any of those. There is no firmer ground for human dignity.
The non-essential presumes the essential.
For the sake of pleasant picnics – and everything else lovely and dear – let’s attack our painful problems without attacking each other, or the democratic institutions that are only as strong as we are. And may we never reject the foundation that undergirds the whole enterprise, and we ourselves. Heaven is still watching – and more than willing to lend a helping hand.
Photo by Kateryna Hliznitsova on Unsplash