This past week I took an amazing trip across the country. I drove with my grandson, Landon, from Huntsville, Alabama to San Diego, California—where he’s stationed in the Marines. It was a journey of love for my grandson and a chance to spend time with him. It was so much more than a road trip; it was an incredible experience I will always treasure.
Mile after mile, as Landon, my grandson, played the Creedence Clearwater Revival station on Spotify, we made our way across the country taking turns driving. The music, conversation, and changing landscape made the miles pass quickly.
While making this journey across the country something else happened-I fell in love with America again. The open road that crossed so many different places made me appreciate our country’s beauty and diversity even more. The journey became a pilgrimage that reignited my faith and imagination in who we are and who we can yet become.
Along the way, I witnessed again how beautiful and diverse the American landscape is. The green fields of the South gave way to the vast horizons of Texas. The sun-baked deserts of Arizona and the rocky canyons of New Mexico finally gave way to the rugged coast of Southern California and the Pacific Ocean. Each landscape was beautiful in its way.
Each community we passed reminded me that we are not one people, but many people. We are woven together by something far more powerful than geography. We as a people are as diverse as our landscape. This diversity is our strength.
It made me wonder what if we learned to look at one another like we would at the changing landscape—not with suspicion or judgment, but with joy and appreciation? What if we respected our differences instead of fearing them? Just as the mountains do not diminish the desert, and the ocean doesn’t erase the prairie, neither does one culture or background lessen another. Together, we form the living terrain of this nation—rough edges and all.
We are bound together by our love of liberty, justice, and equality. No other nation in history has attempted what we’re attempting: constructing a society where people from every corner of the earth can come together, not to become the same, but to become something greater together. This experiment is messy and far from perfect. At times it is frustrating. Yet at the core, it is an act of hope.
These are not easy days for our country. Divisions run deep. Trust in leadership is fractured. The noise of political conflict and cultural tension can be deafening. Sometimes, it is easy to lose sight of all that we could yet become.
I know that there is plenty of reason for criticism and cynicism. Some want to claim that our greatness as a nation can only be achieved by going back to some imagined golden age. Others insist that our best days are behind us.
Yet as I rode across this beautiful country sitting next to my grandson, something like hope and resolve welled up in me.
America’s journey continues. The destination isn’t a place on a map—it’s a promise we make to each other, renewed with every sunrise, every vote, every act of kindness between strangers.
As I glance out the window at the changing landscape and look over at the next generation I want to sing a hymn of praise for America’s beauty and promise and pray that the journey is just beginning.
EnSpirit 