In the day, we sweat it out on the streets
Of a runaway American dream
At night, we ride through mansions of glory
In suicide machines
Sprung from cages out on Highway 9
Chrome wheeled, fuel injected and steppin’ out over the line
Oh, baby this town rips the bones from your back
It’s a death trap, it’s a suicide rap
We gotta get out while we’re young
`Cause tramps like us, baby we were born to run

“Born To Run” speaks of freedom and the open road. “Born to Run” makes you want to hop on a bike with the girl of dreams and head to the highway to see this land of hope and dreams. I rarely feel the same sense of freedom and anything is possible as I get from Born to Run. Then, I saw last night’s roll call at the Democratic National Convention (DNC).

Usually, the roll call is in an arena with delegates from each state stating how many votes each of the nominees will receive from their state. The delegates are passionate and fun. Yet, for all the good nature raucousness of past roll calls, they paled compared to this year’s virtual roll-call.

Instead of having the delegates in the same building this year, the DNC took a virtual vote featuring the delegates giving their votes from their respective home states. Seeing the beauty, diversity and majesty of our country, made me want to hop on a bike with a beautiful girl and head to the highway to see this land of hope and dreams.

The cactus in Arizona. The mountain in Colorado. The beautiful verdant landscape of northern states Idaho, Minnesota an d South Dakota. The farmlands in Iowa, Kansas and Montana. The St. Louis Arch. Pueblo Sandia in New Mexico. The beautiful art in Louisiana, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Virginia and West Virginia. North Dakota’s water. And of course, Rhode Island’s calamari.

What a beautiful, wonderful and diverse country this is!!! With our polarization and seemingly new daily crisis, we forget this is an amazing country. The DNC roll call changed that. We will never doubt America’s beauty again.

O beautiful for halcyon skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the enameled plain!
America! America!
God shed His grace on thee,
Till souls wax fair as earth and air
And music-hearted sea!