When I was a child and lived in America, I was patriotic. I left America when I was fifteen and was still patriotic. America could do no wrong!

Sixty five years away from America and I can see her far more clearly. During the sixties and seventies, with assassinations and civil rights, flower power and Vietnam, I saw some wonderful things and some grotesque and horrific things. I guess I was still patriotic but I wasn’t sure, by any means, that American was always right.

Marriage and house buying, child rearing and job hunting during the eighties, I forgot all about patriotism. I might have sung the Star-Spangled Banner if I heard it but I would just as likely have sung God Save the Queen if I heard that.

In the nineties, Judy came home to die. The American medical system, which is great if you’re very wealthy, offered nothing to my poor sister, aside from a diagnosis of cancer and the certainty that she was going to die within months. And, too, the rise and rise of gun culture, and the unbelievable fact of homeless people living under by-passes made me start to realise that America and American ways did not have all the best answers. I think that was when I was certain that I would never again miss being in the US. The UK has never said it’s the best. It has its faults, its share of homelessness, its areas of poverty, its drug problems but mostly politicians don’t try to convince you that there’s nothing wrong.

When Obama became president I was very pleased. I thought he would be able to make the changes America needed. I didn’t take into account the ways that Congress and things like lobbyists could prevent a president carrying out his goals.

And now. Well, I had never heard of or seen Donald Trump, had no idea of his wealth or lack of, his background of somehow getting out of things that other people were made to do, but what I saw on tv and in the papers from my first glimpse made me fearful for a country who would even consider such a man to be president……and then they elected him!

Thankfully, enough Americans realised that Trump was as incapable of leading the most looked-up-to country in the world and, after four years, elected Joe Biden who is just a year older than I am. He has done some great things for the people of America as well as for the people of much of the world. He’s not perfect, he speaks rather slowly and occasionally forgets a word but he’s a million percent better than the person he ran against. At eighty I forget words but I was doing that at fifty!

When Trump lost, I thought that he would just disappear but January 6, 2021 made me realise that this person would not let go – and he hasn’t. For some reason, some perfectly decent people believe in him. And, of course, some perfectly horrible people, too. Trump is a great liar and does what all bullies do. He contradicts, he shouts, he name-calls, he blames anyone and everyone for his own failings.

I can no longer be patriotic. To me patriotism seems to infer that one’s country can do no harm. Watching the Republicans in the House of Representatives spend all their time looking for ‘high crimes and misdemeanours’ and no time doing the work they were elected to do, must make the most patriotic of Americans feel that somehow, something is wrong.

I love living in England. I have spent 65 years here and, no matter how many or how few years I have left, I will spend the rest here in a place that doesn’t pretend to be the best but is where all the people I love, live.