American individualism was simply the result of people trying to hold on. Far from their normal resources, early pioneers who wanted lives free from entrenched social and political hierarchies – lives where they could be whatever they wanted to be, live however they wanted to live – also had to learn skills well outside their wheelhouse. Tailors became loggers. Lawyers became furniture builders. Housewives became nurses. All by necessity. All in order to survive. What once was called the New Eden – that rediscovered paradise before the fall of man – quickly turned into a land of savagery and hardscrabble living that called for a new breed of man to step up and power through.
This was America in its infancy. This was the America of Benjamin Franklin.
In a pamphlet meant for those living abroad with thoughts of coming to America, this Founding Father expressed the need for those who have “a useful art.” It is fine to be learned, it is acceptable to be well-read, but in addition to all of that, a newcomer to this country better know how to be handy. A person should expect to get their hands dirty. This was the way forward for the fledgling Republic. The American spirit built on can-do and grit.
Sadly, this does not seem to be the case these days. At least among many.
As a boy, I watched my stepfather, uncles, and grampa build things, get dirty, eye a problem shrewdly then get to work. Power tools. Chalk lines. Swinging hammers. They framed out rooms. Built sheds. Split wood. Installed windows. Changed the oil in their vehicles. Lived as Franklin had long ago imagined. Useful. American.
But where is this spirit today? I ask my cellphone-addicted students if they have a useful art, and they give me blank stares. Jiffy Lube changes the oil, and why would anybody want to split wood? Just turn up the thermometer. Simple. Easy. There is no wilderness to tame.
What plagues my students, however, is anxiety … poor mental health … despair. Am I a fool to see a correlation?
John Steinbeck once wrote that there is a line of old men standing on the edge of the Pacific, angry at the ocean because it stopped them. There was nothing else to conquer, no more opportunities to be heroic or, at least, realize that they can do more than what they think they can do.
This is what is conspicuously lacking in our society today. Our young men especially crave to be tested, but in the absence of such challenges that build character and integrity, we are left with a deferential and rudderless generation who would be unrecognizable to the men and women of Franklin’s day. They would not be welcome. They would have no seat at the table, having nothing useful to offer.
I pray for a reverse in this trend. For the sake of our country, we all should.
