Independence Beyond Borders

Today, we're celebrating Independence Day in the U.S.

Our country is 232-years-old, quite young considering England has chairs older than our country, a tidbit shared with me by an English friend during a tour of Winston Churchill's home in Kent.

People will celebrate the Fourth with BBQs, picnics, parades, topped off with the prerequisite evening fireworks.

For me the true meaning of independence came to light during a two-and-a-half year sojourn to Europe and the Middle East in 1976. Fresh out of college, bookish but naive, I left our shores for England just as our country was celebrating its Bicentennial.

It was a time when I would learn to appreciate many of the rights we often take for granted in this country.

Poland during the days of Communist rule was a very different country. Kasia, a student at Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, took pity on this non-Polish speaking American whose first meal in the country came with heads attached, and decided to introduce me to her circle of friends.

At the time, I didn't recognize nor truly appreciate the courage of these students and young workers, whispering to one another in dark, smoky coffee houses, many who I later discovered went on to help shape Poland's Solidarity movement.

Interestingly enough, Independence and innovation are not that far apart.

Innovation surfaces when people give voice to their creative ideas and are free to disrupt the status quo.

Whether you're sitting inside a cloth-walled cube here in Silicon Valley or scribbling an idea in some cafe halfway around the world, as Thomas Friedman so aptly points out in his book of the same name--the world is flat.

Happy Independence Day America. Let's keep the innovation fires burning.

Comments

[Dee McCrorey]

Thanks Jill! I bet you're excited about your citizen journalist coverage of the DNC come August...I'll be following your posts and tweets.

You helped raise the bar for my Big Dreamers show on BlogTalkRadio!

[Jill Foster]

Dee! Happy Belated 4th.

Your reminder on liberties available in this country was refreshing. Thanks for posting this (...and the next Big Dreamers Show looks fantastic).