Boston, Patriots and Cowards

Stand your ground. Don’t fire unless fired upon, but if they mean to have a war, let it begin here.

                                                    - Captain John Parker, Lexington Militia, April 19, 1775

And so were fired the first shots of the American Revolutionary War.  And so was born a nation, and ultimately Patriots Day in commemoration of that day.

Many of my Baltimore friends and social media contacts are aware that I’m from Boston and proud of it; I’ve lived in the Baltimore area for 15 years now but I’ll always be a Boston boy. 

Less well known is that I was raised just outside Boston in Lexington, which had a profound influence on my upbringing and philosophy.  As Lexingtonians, we were taught to hold sacred the traditions and values of the Minutemen: to question authority, to seek justice and human rights for ourselves and others, and to face down those who would trample liberty. To stand our ground in the face of adversity and overwhelming odds (the Minutemen were up against the might of an empire, and did not fare well early on that April morning in Lexington).  

These are American values to be sure, but we were absolutely steeped in them during our childhoods in Lexington and Boston.  This was our local history and the source of both pride and much of our moral composition.

On the Patriots Day of April 15, 2013, the bombs that exploded at the finish line of the Marathon were not only a horrible tragedy to those directly affected, but an egregious affront to these values and traditions.  If you’ve not lived in the Boston area, you may not understand the effect on Bostonians of this event on this particular day.  In Boston and throughout New England this day represents so many things: the start of real spring weather, celebrations of the first battles of the Revolutionary War, a morning Red Sox home game, and the world’s oldest and most prestigious marathon race.  A perfect day for a Lexington kid was to see the battle reenactment on Lexington Green, have a pancake breakfast at a nearby church, see the town’s annual parade, head to Fenway for the Sox and then over to see the final miles of the Marathon. 

To many a Bostonian, Patriots Day is the best day of the year – and it’s very personally our day. 

The coward or cowards responsible for this heinous act have now joined McVeigh and Nichols in trampling on this day.  By killing and maiming innocent people, they utterly perverted this holiday and the ideals it represents. 

I don’t personally know any of those killed and injured on Monday, but upon hearing the news and seeing the horrible images from the finish line, I was seething.  Enraged by the injustice, the innocent lives forever changed and ended, yes – but also by the insult to my city, my country, and the world of people who seek peace and justice.  I will not dare compare my injury to those at the site of the bombing, but everyone who has lived in the Patriot tradition lost something profound on Monday.

And we won’t forget this outrage.

Boston, as many have pointed out, is a tough town.  Boston and Bostonians everywhere will persevere while we recall the people, families and friends affected and the blasts that changed forever how we remember our holiday.  We are grateful for the outpouring of support from the rest of the country and the world.  But with or without that support, we band together.  The person or persons who perpetrated this crime should remember this.

We stand our ground.

We do not fire unless fired upon.

But if they mean to have a war?  Do they think they have cowed us? Like His Majesty’s troops on that morning 238 years ago, they may think they prevailed on Monday -- but I think they picked the wrong damn city to mess with.

And I think they're going to understand that soon enough.