Semper probe in extremum

I did my taxes today. I mentioned yesterday that I'm something of a procrastinator, and filing my taxes is no exception. My 1040 had been sitting in a pile on the floor for about two months, getting covered up with and superseded by other mail and paperwork, and it wasn't until I realized I no longer knew where it was that I decided it was time to sit down with it. Even then I put it off until today, a short day at work which I was determined to put to good use. Because I'm self-employed I have to file two schedules in addition to my 1040, and of course they refer back and forth to each other and it's chaotic, but actually the whole process of filling them out only took an hour or so. I guess that's the payoff for keeping a careful account ledger during the year; when you need your revenue and expenses they're already calculated and ready to be plugged in.

Anyway, between filing taxes and watching Persepolis I spent a good deal of the day thinking about America. Or feeling about America, I suppose would be more accurate. I've spent my entire life here, apart from a week abroad here and there; it's easy to forget that the United States is one of a select few countries that Lover's Lanes could ever happen in. Other countries are too small, or too insular, or too uniform, or they don't have developed interstate systems, or their governments regulate travel or the press or for that matter love. Even America regulates love to some degree, of course -- but I can interview someone about how laws against gay marriage affect his relationship, and while my country still says he isn't entitled to the same stability and protection as a straight man, at least I'm permitted to write about it. That's the value of free speech and of democracy. When there is injustice, you can change minds and change hearts, and in the long term that is enough to change the law. To hell with "in God we trust;" our motto could be "we get it right, eventually." Semper probe in extremum. The story of our history to date, and hopefully far into the future.

And yet we're so diverse. It's breathtaking to remember that this is a country that unifies the Appalachian Mountains with the Mojave Desert, New York City with Oklahoma City, and a million points in between. I really can travel for a day and end up in a different culture. Yes, the things that unite us are greater than the things that divide us, but which do you think we notice first? That's part of the reason the idea of Lover's Lanes has such appeal to me: love is one thing I can count on to be universal, though how we feel it and how we act on it might not be. I want to hear the stories of someone whose life has been different from mine, who seems to bear no resemblance to me, and see if I can find in the tales of such an exotic person themes I know from my own years. I want to find the common humanity that underlies our experiences. My subjects and I are all American. Can I discover our united states?