An email to George and all that he accomplished

As I write on this 2-22-22 it is George Washington's birth date in 1732 — and would have been 290 years old this year. I was attempting to Google this information not realizing I was still in my email … and suddenly his name appeared in the heading. Don't think I'll be emailing him anytime soon!

But if I could …

Your life — could you only know — has been written in books and made into movies. Your name — be it George or Washington — is all over the place in this United States of America. Your likeness is even carved in rock. Your birthday a holiday. I'm sure it would all come as a shock.

Your boyhood sounds idyllic. Except for the part of inheriting slaves from a young age. I know, you grew up on a plantation, and it was “the way things were.” You came to know how wrong any kind of slavery is — the world fights it yet today — and you ultimately “did the right thing” — although in my estimation you might have been a whole lot quicker about it.

This letter is more about your early life. Some things in these years have really caught my attention. You had older half-siblings — besides your own five brothers and sisters. And it seems as if you and your half-brother Lawrence were close — even with 14 years between you. You had someone to lean on at age 11 when your father died — for a little while at least.

I'm sorry Lawrence contracted tuberculosis. What an adventure traveling at 19 to Barbados with him, for that warm sunshine. But no fun coming down with smallpox. You kept the scars as a permanent reminder. And you lost Lawrence the next year. It must have been salve for that sorrow when you inherited his Mount Vernon estate at only 30 years old.

It was Lawrence's service that motivated you to seek a commission in the Virginia militia. And at 21 you began your career. Not without glitches. You surrendered your British forces at the Battle of Fort Necessity in Pennsylvania to the French and Indians. But you were right back in it at 23, as an aide this time, to General Braddock. You were sick with dysentery and left behind in the main battle to rout the French from the Ohio Country — but when you did arrive, still sick, you rallied the British survivors of the French and Indian ambush and helped them escape. Having two horses shot from under you, and bullets piercing your hat and coat! Just the start of what lay ahead for you.

Of course, those of us who know our history, know your lifelong heroics. You were one determined man. No one is perfect. You had your moments. But those of us who were not there — which is all of us these hundreds of years later — cannot know all you endured to secure us a nation.

So this “email” is sent to say your effort paid off. To thank you for taking on all you did. For being Commander in Chief of those fledgling United Colonies in the American War for Independence, for being the first President to lead our country. Somebody had to do it.

You, sir, are worthy to have your face set in stone.