Here I was thinking I was all English… until the USA played the UK in the World Cup.

yankeebean

A lot of my posts over the past year have been about how I’m starting to feel like like I’m half American and half English.  In spite of my American genes, I don’t know what’s going on in the news there, I don’t know what movies are out there or what’s on TV there.  My vocal volume has dropped by at least 30%, I never tip more than 10% and my love for English chocolate has increased by 100%.

I was really starting to settle in to the idea of being English.

Until…

THE WORLD CUP

That’s right… it’s shown me my true colours.  Or maybe I should say ‘colo u rs’, given my recent behavio u r

There I was, thinking, “I’m going to enjoy watching the World Cup this year.  I can root for America AND England and it will all be very inclusive and United Nations-y.  Pip Pip, freakin’ awesome to combine the phrases of my people…”

But when they played the American national anthem at the opening of the USA v UK game, I shot to my feet like my Grandpa used to make me when I was a kid.  When a friend of mine started to talk during it I said, “No Talking!  This is important!” – I’m not kidding.  I actually said that.

Prior to the game I’d printed out one American flag and one English flag so that Mr. Nice Guy and I could each root for our teams.  (We had two Canadian friends over and they brought lots of Canadian paraphernalia, too.  We made them promise to break up any fisty-cuffs that broke out between me and my guy.)

My additional patriotism, fashioned from any old name badge clip and a patch I keep hidden in my crochet bag for moral support

I printed out those flags as a bit of a fun and for a joke.  But I quickly decided I didn’t have ENOUGH patriotic evidence and scrambled to find my American flag patch, which I fashioned into a badge and wore on my shirt.  Along with my red, white and blue skirt and silver sparkly shoes…

I instantly became 100% American.  I waved my flag.  I cheered for my team.  I kept saying like, “Our goalie is really good” and “We’re looking good out there!” and then realising, as I looked around the room, that there was no one else to be a part of my “our”s and “we”s.

But I didn’t mind.  It felt good to be 100% American again

I’m looking forward to the rest of the World Cup!  I’d LOVE it if America won, but I’d also be afraid to walk down the street by myself – only time will tell, eh?

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