How could anyone not feel patriotic?
On Saturday, as white sails billowed across New York Harbor and visitors from around the world gathered in the greatest city on earth to celebrate America’s milestone birthday, it was hard not to feel profoundly grateful.
I had the honor of sailing with what was billed as the largest flotilla in history, surrounded by dozens of fighter jets roaring overhead, during the spectacular celebration marking America’s 250th birthday.
I was aboard the 105-foot America 2.0, a schooner named in tribute to the vessel that won the first America’s Cup in 1851. These days, the boat usually carries passengers on scenic day sails along the Hudson.
For the occasion, America 2.0 was chosen to escort Sweden’s Gladan. We kept pace with the 129-foot ship as its naval recruits climbed into the rigging and stood along the masts with arms outstretched — an international gesture of peace — holding the pose long after we passed beneath the Verrazzano-Narrows Bridge.
International warships surrounded us as we cut through the harbor’s striking green waters. We also had a front-row view as Vice President JD Vance departed from the USS Kearsarge, where he delivered a stirring reflection: “Everything that we have done as a country, we have done together.”
Those of us on board could hardly hold back tears as the International Aerial Review thundered above us, capped by the Blue Angels streaking across the sky and trailing red, white and blue smoke.
As we sailed past Brooklyn and Staten Island and then up alongside Manhattan, I found myself imagining what this same waterway looked like 250 years ago — long before these shores were transformed into one of the world’s most recognizable skylines.
When George Washington’s rebel army fortified the New York Harbor at the outset of the Revolutionary War, igniting the year-long period of the war that patriots had control of Manhattan.
When Washington returned several years later in a parade of sails celebrating his recent election as the first US president.
When the concrete jungle was a lush and forested jewel of the Lenape — thousands of years before Henry Hudson sailed through the river and claimed it for himself.
And I couldn’t help but think of how I was tracing the same voyage through the Harbor that my great-grandmother made as a teenager in 1900 when she left Ireland for a better life.
I thought of my grandmother who left Australia for love, of my FDNY hero father and uncles who risked their lives on 9/11 to save their neighbors, of my mother who gave her five kids everything she had.
And how so many of my neighbors have stories just like ours.
There’s a reason the biggest, most impressive and momentous celebration for the USA took place in New York City. And there’s a reason dozens of countries came to the Big Apple to celebrate our milestone with us.
And how lucky does that make us?
