Happy 4th of July

 The Day’s Celebrations

Photos © 2026 mae sander

Celebrating July 4: Thomas Jefferson and George Washington

 Thomas Jefferson

Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson near Charlottesville, Virginia (photo from our visit in 2023)

Jefferson’s statue at the University of Virginia, which he founded.
He designed both this building (The Rotunda) and Monticello,
which is several miles away, outside of the city on a hilltop.

View from a window of Monticello, The rooms, we learned from our tour leader,
have camouflaged doors to enable slaves to come in and out and avoid being seen
by the white inhabitants.

The Fourth of July is a splendid holiday, which most Americans celebrate with fireworks, picnics, and outdoor get-togethers with friends and family. I think that the central theme of the holiday— American freedom — is genuinely remembered along with the founders of the nation and their great works: the Declaration of Independence (July 4) and the Constitution.

However, there’s another side of things to remember: that the vile institution of slavery enabled the comfortable and contemplative lives of many of the founders, particularly Jefferson and Washington. Their luxurious and pleasant estates, which are maintained as monuments to the men and their lifestyle, memorialize both the lives of masters and of slaves, and remind us both of slavery and of the remarkable struggle for freedom from tyranny and colonialism.

From The Guardian (source)

In the Guardian June 2 one of Thomas Jefferson’s descendants discussed his complex feelings about his famous ancestor. Shannon LaNier (in photo) is the sixth great-grandson of Jefferson with Sally Hemings his slave and mistress. He says:

“I wish he would have done more to free the enslaved people and practise what he actually preached,” LaNier, 47, says by phone from New York. “I know he tried to but he was the most powerful man in the country and he could have done more and he was living a double life so it’s unfortunate.

“‘Sometimes I appreciate what he’s done for this country and how much of a genius he was,’ Lanier continues. ‘Other times I hate what he did and that he didn’t do more, and the hypocritical aspects, because we could have been so much further along as a society if he would have done what was right instead of what was profitable.’”

Jefferson in Paris

"Thomas Jefferson lived in Paris from August 1784 to September 1789: five years that were ..., 'arguably the most memorable of his life. Paris—with its music, its architecture, its savants and salons, its learning and enlightenment, not to mention its elegant social life ... had worked its enchantments on this rigidly self-controlled Virginia gentleman, and had stimulated him to say and do and write remarkable things.'"'

George Washington

Mount Vernon, the home of George Washington — also an impressive estate enabled by slave labor.

Slave cabin at Mount Vernon

George Washington remains, in most American’s minds, “The Father of his Country.” His leadership during the War of Independence, which we celebrate this week, was not only brilliant, but surely was essential to the success of the endeavor — revolutionary in every sense. 

Remembering Washington during this celebration of freedom, we can’t help also remembering that he was the owner of 125 slaves, as well as the master of many others owned by his wife’s family. Regarding slavery, Washington wrote:

“I never mean (unless some particular circumstance should compel me to it) to possess another slave by purchase: it being among my first wishes to see some plan adopted by the legislature by which slavery in the Country may be abolished by slow, sure, & imperceptible degrees.”

A few years ago, we toured Mount Vernon. The tour includes the beautiful home where Washington lived whenever he could escape his responsibilities as a military man and a political leader, and also includes the row of slave cabins near the house. The contrast between the lives of masters and slaves is cruelly obvious.  

An Uncomfortable Truth of History

Thinking about the contradictions in the lives of the founders of our nation on the day we celebrate their accomplishments is challenging. It’s more fun to just celebrate! But I also try to remember our history, as expressed by a variety of Americans.

For example, I’m thinking of Frederick Douglass, a former slave and one of the effective opponents of slavery before the Civil War. On July 5, 1852, he addressed an Independence Day celebration titled “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” … It was a scathing speech in which Douglass stated, “This Fourth of July is yours, not mine, You may rejoice, I must mourn.” (source)

I hope we are better now.

Blog post © 2026 mae sander

Weekend Fun

French Detectives

“Murder In…” — a very long series that we just started.

“L’Art du Crime” — sometimes far-fetched, but usually fun.

Both of these series have subtitles, of course, but I can still sometimes understand what they are saying in French. Both have tons of local color! French provincial towns and cities or Paris and the Louvre. All great to see.

Celebrating the Fourth of July

More Fireworks Photos

I love fireworks! So glad for this unofficial display in our local park.

Saturday Afternoon Ride in the Countryside

The corn is growing in the fields not far from our small city.

Reading fiction and essays 

Homage to Kafka: Ten Short Stories

a cage went in search of a bird

I can’t read all these stories one-after-another, the way I read a regular anthology, because the writers were doing homage to Kafka. Therefore most of the selections are very weird, surreal, and frightening. Characters are trapped or they are uncomprehending, or they are desperate to control their own circumstances which have gotten away from them. The fear and dislocations expressed here seem to outdo Kafka, whose 100th death anniversary they were written to celebrate — he died on June 3, 1924. Some of the stories seem more like Italo Calvino than like Kafka because they are not only surreal but they double back on themselves in a self-referential way.

If somehow you decide to read this collection, consider yourself warned!

Homage to Nobody: Essays by Rebecca Solnit

Essays by Rebecca Solnit: all written before the current administration took over.

The world was already becoming strange and disastrous when these collected essays were written a few years ago, many during or just after the pandemic. The book was published in 2025, but the author’s position of cautious optimism about the future of a number of issues (even climate change) and about the possibility of political action to mitigate them seem depressingly retro. I can’t bear this optimism in view of this past six months of rapid decommissioning of positive endeavors of the US government and the replacement of responsible officials with lackeys who oppose the earlier policies and are only destructive.

The more I read these essays from the past, even with a few author’s notes written in 2025, the more I simply find them painfully obsolete. The small possible changes played up in Solnit’s essays are now obliterated by our newly powerful backwards-looking and kleptocratic government. The possibility, for example, that there could be some way to counter fossil fuel dominance has been utterly cancelled along with the defunding of most government-funded projects to overcome it and the re-empowering of the interests of the fossil fuel industry. Ditto social change. Ditto environmentalism. Optimism is now simply crazy.

The more I read, the more I find myself speed reading because Solnit’s rosy view that small changes will counter big trends has become so impossible. Virtually all positive actions for racial and social justice, environmental protection, higher education, and many other virtuous initiatives once taken by our nation have been brutally cancelled in just half a year by the new administration. Horrifying!

Some depressing quotes:

“A standard complaint of the right: the real victim is the racist who has been called a racist, not the victim of his racism; the real oppression is to be impeded in your freedom to oppress.” (p. 81)

  

“The Covid-19 pandemic was, like the climate crisis, a reminder that we are interconnected and that what we do as individuals and together affects the whole; that’s a scientific fact rather than a political position, but those who reject the facts treat them as political opinions (and in some versions of the libertarian worldview, everyone gets to have their own facts).” (p. 59)

“Of course, in the face of the climate crisis, sticking with the status quo isn’t an option. We either make the changes science has shown are necessary and engineering has made possible, or we let runaway change of the worst kind devastate people and places.” (p. 155) 

“All mining needs to be done with respect for the land and people in the vicinity, but the impact of mining for renewables needs to be weighed against the far more devastating impact of mining for and burning fossil fuel.” (p. 144) 

Don’t bother to read this book — it no longer speaks to our current situation, and there are much more important issues to think about! Of course I hope that some miracle will stop the current effort to create a totalitarian and anti-progressive government in Washington, but I have no rational reason to expect this outcome.

Quote for Today

“More than 80 years ago, as France was under occupation and repression, America welcomed exiled researchers, offering them a helping hand and allowing them to keep science alive. And now, in a sad reversal of history, some American scientists have arrived in France in search of a space for freedom, thought and research.” — Éric Berton, president of  Aix-Marseille University, quoted in the Guardian.

Sunday Morning In My Garden 

Blog post © 2025 mae sander

Critters, Art, and Happy 4th of July

A chipmunk lives on my porch  (or maybe a few of them). He resents us when we sit out there.
He often perches on the railing when we are not bothering him.

A Carolina Wren has a nest on Nat’s windowsill. (Photo by Carol/Nat)

Penguins! Alice found this graffiti in Paris.

Another Paris Mona Lisa from Alice and Evelyn.

From my friend Roberta who is also in Paris.

Random web Mona. Something to do with AI.

Another graffiti from Alice. This one is in Strasbourg. 

New murals at the Stravinsky Fountain in Paris. Photo by Evelyn.

Woodworking

Len has been working with new tools and a variety of wood — poplar, maple, and oak — recently. The three boxes in the photos are the very useful results of his project.

Happy Fourth of July!

“The Flag is Bleeding” by Faith Ringgold (1930-2024).
On this July 4th, as I did last year, I have both patriotic and pessimistic feelings.

Update: fireworks this year.

How Happy?

An example of what we have to lose from our government’s policies.

Illustrating why we should fear for our democracy and institutions that we cherish, here's a quote from Michael Roth, president of Wesleyan University, posted on Robert Reich's Substack:

Under pressure from the Trump administration, the University of Virginia’s president of nearly seven years, James Ryan, stepped down Friday, declaring that while he was committed to the university and inclined to fight, he could not in good conscience push back just to save his job.

The Department of Justice demanded that Ryan resign in order to resolve an investigation into whether UVA sufficiently complied with Trump’s orders banning diversity, equity, and inclusion.

UVA dissolved its DEI office in March, though Trump’s lackeys claim the university didn’t go far enough in rooting out DEI.

This is the first time the Trump regime has explicitly tied grant dollars to the resignation of a university official. It’s unlikely to be the last.

The New US Budget

While I have been writing this blog post, the US House and Senate passed a bill that will cause suffering and death throughout our country and the world, while enriching the already rich members of our society.

• This bill defunds much of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which helps feed people in need (source). Without the funding that has supported food programs and welfare programs in America, there will be men, women, and children going hungry. 
• This bill reduces benefits from Medicaid, which provides healthcare to low-income and disabled Americans, cutting $1 trillion from its funding: 11.8 million more people are predicted to be without health insurance by 2034 (source). 
• This bill defunds many important global health initiatives. Without ongoing funding for programs to prevent and treat AIDS in the US and throughout the world, more people will be infected and victims will die: possibly an additional 6 million HIV infections and 4 million Aids-related deaths by 2029 (source). 
• Environmental programs have also been cut or eliminated. 
• Because of tax cuts for wealthy Americans, this bill will add billions of dollars to the National Debt. 

Sadly, I am thinking about these terrible consequences of the new budget as we celebrate our most patriotic holiday.

“Today, Donald Trump and the Republican party sent a message to America: if you are not a billionaire, we don’t give a damn about you,” said Ken Martin, the Democratic National Committee chair.

Blog post © 2025 mae sander

Shared with Eileen’s Critters, Deb’s Sunday Salon, and Sami’s Murals.

The First Week in July

Fun on the Fourth of July

For Deb’s Sunday Salon (link), here are some of the things I’ve done this week,  beginning of course with our July 4th celebration. Nine of us gathered in our back yard to have a barbecue. Here are just a few photos of the great foods we enjoyed.

Ready for guests.

Kabobs: mushrooms, sausage and peppers, ready to grill.

Grilling! We also made chicken and onion kabobs.

Nat made a Nantucket Blueberry pie: same as he ate as a child when his family had a summer place in Nantucket.
His mother knew all the good berry bushes. Nat knows where to pick great wild blueberries here in Michigan.

Jason made two kinds of ice cream: cherry and blackberry. We also had a box of strawberry ice cream.

After dinner: fireworks in the park.

What I’ve Been Reading

Listening Woman by Tony Hillerman (1925-2008)

Listening Woman was published in 1978, the third of Hillerman's twenty-five books about Navajo tribal policemen Joe Leaphorn and (in the later books) Jim Chee. Hillerman was recognized for his knowledgable presentation of Navajo individuals and their culture. To solve a murder and several other open cases, Leaphorn must use enormous reasoning skill, knowledge of the hostile mountain and desert terrain, and understanding of Navajo traditions and beliefs. He also has to use his grasp of how to deal with the FBI agents who are assigned to the cases he is solving. As he hides in a cave while rescuing a number of hostages from some very murderous criminals, he risks his life over and over and deploys incredible cunning and bravery. Not to mention 33 hours without food. It's a great book! 

Two other books I read and reviewed this week.

Afternoon Coffee

At Argus Farm Stop: windows depict the local eggs, produce, milk that are sold here.

Shopping

In the Garden

Blog post © 2024 mae sander