Dee believes that the celebration of Canadian confederation is called O Canada Day because she spent the last school year being indoctrinated into nationalism here with the singing of the national anthem every Monday morning. I suppose this is better than the nationalism she would have been brainwashed with back in the States with its emphasis on consumerism and multi-cultural disdain and media cult worship.
I have always been struck with the Canadian way of building up to a national holiday and the fervor of the day itself. I never saw anything like it in the States. We did not run around on the Fourth wishing one and other a “Happy Independence Day” the way Canadians great each other with “Happy Canada Day!” It’s almost like Christmas.
Of course, Canadians have real stat holidays that are more than vacations for the Post Office and bankers which undoubtedly plays into their enthusiasm, and it is the first holiday of the summer because summer here has really only just begun.
Today we are off to the parade in town and a festival on the town square, such as it is. Mom and Auntie are here and looking forward to their first Canada Day and first Fourth of July outside the U.S. We don’t commemorate the Fourth up here by the way. I know I say this a lot but Canadians really have little interest in the U.S. beyond television and movies. Really. Oh, and did you hear that soon culture will be the major export of the U.S.A? Also, really really. Rob heard it on Fox Radio, and they know.
Mom can’t get her mind around the reason for Canada Day.
“It’s like our Fourth of July, right?” she asked Rob.
“Um, no, we didn’t have to revolt for our independence,” he said. Hence the lack of pseudo explosions and the like. I do not miss the snap, crackly and pop of the Fourth. Every year I was certain one of my dim-witted neighbors was going to burn my house down with the illegal bounty they’d smuggled up from Missouri.*
Happy Canada Day to all and to all a good day.
*There are people in Missouri whose livelihoods are made in the weeks leading up to the Fourth as Iowans pour over the border in search of fireworks to blind themselves with while losing critical digits in the process.
anniegirl1138 
Here’s a great piece that ran in the New York Times today. Canadian ex-pats tell what they miss the most about home.
We have a dichotomy here in Washington. Fireworks are legal on most of the reservations, and illegal everywhere else in the state. Somehow, the Indians always make a lot of money on fireworks that supposedly can’t be used anywhere but on the reservation. There’s always some idiot shooting off fireworks long after they should be in bed. They are usually drunk, and the ones that end up in the ER blinded and maimed. I may go to the big fireworks show this year, or I may stay home. I’m not big on crowds, and since our two shows have been condensed into one this year, I think it will be very crowded.