Summer School...Liberty Enlightening the World

Today is the 130th Anniversary of France’s delivery of the Statue of liberty. Who doesn’t love the verdigris but I wish that I could have seen the original copper color. My kids, or the children formerly know as "the girls" before their brother came along, were arguing about the statues face being modeled after the artist’s mother. I realized that they could learn valuable life lessons from the statue of liberty.

Friendship

The Statue of Liberty was a joint effort between France and the United States, intended to commemorate the lasting friendship between the peoples of the two nations. After all, isn’t life just navigating the ups and downs of a series of friendships and relationships? Choose your friends wisely. Pick friends that will make you a better person, not people who will bring you down.

Cooperation

The French sculptor Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi created the statue itself out of sheets of hammered copper, while Alexandre-Gustave Eiffel, the man who designed Paris’s Eiffel Tower, designed the statue’s steel framework. The Statue of Liberty was then given to the United States and erected atop a pedestal designed  by American, Richard Morris Hunt. It sits on a small island in Upper New York Bay, now known as Liberty Island. See how great things can happen when everyone pitches in and does their part. We are all better working together than any one of us is working alone.

Hospitality

Over the years, the statue stood tall as millions of immigrants arrived in America via nearby Ellis Island; a federal immigration station. We should be kind and welcoming towards others. Always treat other people the way you would like to be treated.

Today, the Statue of Liberty remains an enduring symbol of freedom and democracy. Make sure you value and are grateful your freedom. Even though it has the word free in it, it is not free; it is precious and requires great sacrifice. It must be fought for and protected at all cost. Fight not only for your own freedom but also fight for those who cannot fight for themselves.