In many parts of the world, the patriotism shown by us Americans seems slightly exaggerated.
But why shouldn’t we be fiercely proud of the country we live in? That we take pride in the values and ideals that the nation represents could only ever be considered a positive thing.
If you’re a patriotic American man or woman, you’ll know everything about what our country stands for.
You’ll know its history, the times that tested society and threatened to crumble the nation’s very foundations. You’ll know how our country pulled through, time and time again, in the face of the unthinkable: wars, terrorist attacks, natural disasters.
Rick Guerino Jr. considers himself a patriotic American, so much so that the star-spangled banner flies proudly in front of his home.
It was the 9/11 attacks that encouraged Rick to install a flag pole in his front yard.
On one particularly windy day in February, Rick’s flag pole was blown to the ground. Most people would probably think nothing of this, but not one FedEx driver.
Speaking to CBS New York, Rick explained that he received an alert from his Ring doorbell camera that someone was near his home.
He said:
“I just saw a FedEx guy coming up my driveway, and I didn’t know why, because I wasn’t getting a package. And all of a sudden he bent down and picked up my flag.”
Rick watched the FedEx driver in real-time as he paused along his delivery route to remove Rick’s flag from the pole.
At first, it’s not certain what he’s about to do – run off with the flag, maybe?
People steal the strangest things nowadays, so the thought probably went through Rick’s head as he watched the footage.
But instead, the worker simply folded the flag up the proper way and placed it on Rick’s porch.
Knowing that he’d just witnessed something special, Rick posted the footage to Facebook.
It was viewed more than 300,000 times, and its viral status quickly caught media attention. It was because of this that Rick was able to identify the driver as Chris Oslovitch and thank him for what he did.
Chris had simply acted on instinct, and, had Rick not had a Ring doorbell camera installed, he never would have known who had folded his flag so carefully.
Chris believes that US citizens should be proud of where they come from.
He said that folding the flag was “the respectful thing to do”, adding:
“When you see something like that, you know, you can’t just drive past it and ignore it. It’s something that just caught my eye and I had to do something about it.”
How many of us knew that there was a proper way to fold the American flag? As a young man, Chris has proved that patriotism certainly isn’t dying out with the older generation.
It turns out that Chris’s father had been one of the first responders to receive on the scene after the 9/11 attacks.
Sometimes it’s the most terrible situations, the ones that we would never hope for, that end up uniting us in the most unexpected way.
Both of Chris’s grandfathers had also served in the war, and he said that his upbringing was “respectable” and “strict”.
It seems like Chris and Rick would certainly get on well, and the pair plan on having dinner together soon.
You can watch the touching moment that Chris folds the fallen flag in the video below!
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