What does it mean to say, "I love my country"?

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a maple leaf from eastern Canada

I love my car
I love our cat
I love my country

I love my partner
I love my parents
I love my country

I love your garden
I love their goldfish
I love my country

I love his hair
I love your house
I love my country

Is all this love — this loving things — the same? Equal? Worthy of the word?

Hmmmmmm….

Throwing love around is easy
when it’s just a word… 
but put into action
and what does it actually mean?

We hear “I love my country” a lot from politicians, especially these days with politics far and near being what they are — fractious, divisive, often snappy, sometimes scary.

What do the politicians mean?

That they love the people and the animals and the nature within the man-drawn boundaries of the geography they call country? That they will protect them with their heart, their head and their work?

That they love the opportunities a particular geographic place has given them?

That they would march to the border and protect everything — and everyone — within the country’s boundaries at all costs, even die for it in service to it?

I wonder…

In the early days of an intimate relationship with another person, we wait for the magic words, I love you, because (we believe) they signify the relationship is moving to the next level of feeling and commitment. Often, those words mean exactly that. Sometimes, they don’t.

Outside of that context of inter human connection, what does “I love…” mean? What does it amount to when applied to a country. How do we embody that love, live out that love?

Wherever our country is, it is physical and tangible: solid ground beneath our feet, trees that shade us, landscapes that shape us… But our country is also a feeling: the spirit of patriotism (Canada is not for sale!), the support of community (You belong!), the culture of family (You’re one of us!).

If you and I are living within the same geographic boundaries, is “my country” for me what “my country” is for you?

Canada is bounded by water to the north, the west and the east, and to the south by a man-drawn border line. As a white woman within those borders, I enjoy a life of privilege, security, and meaning. As a citizen, the Canada I experience every day is different from the Canada a refugee woman of colour experiences as she navigates the ins and outs of her new life here. Can we both love this country called Canada in the same way when our experiences are so different? Does any difference in that love matter? Can she love this new country and also love her old country, too, still, always? How many flags can we gather over our lifetime to claim as ‘ours’, to claim for ‘loving’?

I don’t know the answer to any of these questions. Do you?

One thing I know for sure: The phrase “I love this country” coming out of the mouth of a politician looking to put the question of “her” province separating from Canada to a referendum this fall is playing with fire both existential and economic.

Are we not bound, one to the other, in this country carved into 10 provinces and three territories — bound by geography, history, experience, values, appreciation for, and, yes, even love, for the vast physical beauty and human potential of Canada? With all our differences, I want to live in this complicated relationship, all together — for the long haul, for better or worse, in times of prosperity and in times of paucity. We are, I believe, stronger together. Standing alone is exhilarating in the moment, but once that feeling dissipates, where will you land? Who will be with you? How will you live together, alone, apart from what once was all our home?

I don’t know the answer to these questions. Do you?

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Background, political: Canada's western province of Alberta is toying with the idea of separating from Canada. Polls are showing the majority is not interested; however, the province's Premier is committed to putting a question about having a referendum on the ballot this fall. She calls this "direct democracy". (But isn't that what a general election is? Why not just call a general election, Premier Danielle Smith? I know the answer to that question, and I suspect she does, too!)

Background, personal: I was born in the province of Ontario and have lived in that province, in Quebec, in Alberta, in Nova Scotia, in New Brunswick, and I now live in Manitoba. I studied in British Columbia and have holidayed on Prince Edward Island; I have driven across Canada from Alberta to Nova Scotia and from Manitoba to British Columbia. I am sorry never to have travelled to any of the territories or to Newfoundland. I speak English as my first language, French as my second, German is somewhere in the back of my brain. I believe that my experience of living in different provinces in this huge country helps me understand that its potential exists in the very differences that define the regions and the peoples that make up this land. I, literally, cannot understand how anyone can believe that separating from the whole would make their individual lone part stronger. 

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Land acknowledgement: I respectfully recognize that I live on the original lands of Anishinaabe, Cree, Oji-Cree, Dakota and Dene peoples, and on the homeland of the Métis Nation.


Photo by Guillaume Jaillet on Unsplash


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